WHEN 

A  MAN 
RIES 


mms 


MARY 

ROBERTS 
RINEHART 


lilliillflliii!  (Hi! 


WHEN  A  MAN  MARRIES 


WHEN 
A  MAN  MARRIES 


Sy 
MARY  ROBERTS  RINEHART 

Author  of 

THE  CIRCULAR  STAIRCASE 
THE  MAN  IN  LOWER  TEN,  ETC. 


ILLUSTRATIONS  BY 

HARRISON  yiSHE 

AND 

MAYO  BUNKER 


INDIANAPOLIS 

THE  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 
PUBLISHERS 


COPYRIGHT  1909 
THE  BOBBS-MERRILL  COMPANY 


PRESS  OF 

BRAUNWORTH  &  CO- 

BOOKBINDERS  AND  PRINTERS 

BROOKLYN,  N.  Y. 


96 


Needles  and  pins, 
Needles  and  pins, 

WTien  a  man  marries 
His  trouble  begins, 


918951 


CONTENTS 

CHAPTER  PAGE 

I  AT  LEAST  I  MEANT  WELL  1 

II  THE  WAY  IT  BEGAN  15 

III  I  MIGHT  HAVE  KNOWN  IT  34> 

IV  THE  DOOR  WAS  CLOSED  56 
V  FROM  THE  TREE  OF  LOVE  72 

VI  A  MIGHTY  POOR  JOKE  91 

VII  WE  MAKE  AN  OMELET  111 

VIII  CORRESPONDENTS'  DEPARTMENT  136 

IX  FLANNIGAN'S  FIND  151 

X  ON  THE  STAIRS  165 

XI  I  MAKE  A  DISCOVERY  179 

XII  THE  ROOF  GARDEN  189 

XIII  HE  DOES  NOT  DENY  IT  207 

XIV  ALMOST,  BUT  NOT  QUITE  225 
XV  SUSPICION  AND  DISCORD  240 

XVI  I  FACE  FLANNIGAN  259 

XVII  A  CLASH  AND  A  Kiss  270 

XVIII  IT'S  ALL  MY  FAULT  281 

XIX  THE  HARBISON  MAN  293 

XX  BREAKING  OUT  IN  A  NEW  PLACE  301 

XXI  A  BAR  OF  SOAP  309 

XXII  IT  WAS  DELIRIUM  330 

XXIII  COMING  341 


WHEN  A  MAN  MARRIES 


WHEN  A  MAN  MARRIES 

CHAPTER  I 

AT   LEAST   I    MEANT   WELL 


JWHEN  the  dreadful  thing  occurred 

that  night,  every  one  turned  on  me. 

i 

'The  injustice  of  it  hurt  me  most. 

I 

They  said  /  got  up  the  dinner,  that  / 
asked  them  to  give  up  other  engagements 
and  come,  that  /  promised  all  kinds  of  jollification,  if 
they  would  come ;  and  then  when  they  did  come  and 
got  in  the  papers,  and  every  one — but  ourselves — 
laughed  himself  black  in  the  face,  they  turned  on  me! 
If  who  suffered  ten  times  to  their  one !  I  shall  never 
forget  what  Dallas  Brown  said  to  me,  standing  with 
a  coal  shovel  in  one  hand  and  a — well,  perhaps  it 
would  be  better  to  tell  it  all  in  the  order  it  happened. 
It  began  with  Jimmy  Wilson  and  a  conspiracy, 

II 


:  /.WHEN  A  MAN  MARRIES 


was  helped  on  by  a  foot-square  piece  of  yellow  paper 
and  a  Japanese  butler,  and  it  enmeshed  and  mixed 
up  generally  ten  respectable  members  of  society  and 
a  policeman.  Incidentally,  it  involved  a  pearl  collar 
and  a  box  of  soap,  which  sounds  incongruous, 
doesn't  it  ? 

It  is  a  great  misfortune  to  be  stout,  especially  for 
a  man.  Jim  was  rotund  and  looked  shorter  than  he 
really  was,  and  as  all  the  lines  of  his  face,  or  what 
should  have  been  lines,  were  really  dimples,  his  face 
was  about  as  flexible  and  full  of  expression  as  a 
pillow  in  a  tight  cover.  The  angrier  he  got  the  fun 
nier  he  looked,  and  when  he  was  raging,  and  his 
neck  swelled  up  over  his  collar  and  got  red,  he  was 
entrancing.  And  everybody  liked  him,  and  bor 
rowed  money  from  him,  and  laughed  at  his  pictures 
(he  has  one  in  the  Hargrave  gallery  in  London  now, 
so  people  buy  them  instead),  and  smoked  his  ciga 
rettes,  and  tried  to  steal  his  Jap.  The  whole  story 
hinges  on  the  Jap. 

The  trouble  was,  I  think,  that  no  one  took  Jim 
seriously.  His  ambition  in  life  was  to  be  taken 

2 


THE  WHOLE  STORY  HINGES  ON  THE  JAP 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

seriously,  but  people  steadily  refused  to.     His  art 

\\.is  a  hii£c  joke  except  to  himself.  If  he  asked 
people  to  dinner,  every  one  expected  a  frolic.  When 
he  married  Hella  Knowlcs.  people  ehnekled  at  the 
wedding,  and  considered  it  the  wildest  prank  of 
Jimmy's  career,  although  Jim  himself  seemed  to 
take  it  awfully  hard. 

We  had  all  known  them  hoth  for  years.  1  went  to 
Farmington  with  Bella,  and  Anne  Bro\\n  \\  as  her 
matron  of  honor  when  she  mairied  Jim.  My  first 
winter  out.  Jimmy  had  paid  me  a  lot  of  attention. 
lie  painted  my  poi  trait  in  oils  and  had  a  studio  tea 
to  exhihit  it.  It  was  a  very  nice  picture,  hut  it  did 
not  look  like  me.  so  I  stayed  awav  from  the  exhihi 
tion.  Jim  asked  me  to.  lie  said  he  was  not  a  pho 
tographer.  and  that  anyhow  the  rest  of  my  features 
called  for  the  nose  he  had  ;>i\en  me.  and  that  all  the 
(iren:-e  women  have  lonj;  necks.  I  ha\e  not. 

A  fur  1  had  refused  Jim  t  \\icc  he  met  l-clla  at  a 
camp  in  the  Adirondacks  and  when  he  came  hack  he 
came  at  once  to  see  me.  He  seemed  to  think  I 
would  he  sorry  to  lose  him.  and  he  blundered  over 

4 


AT    LEAST   I    MEANT    WELL 

the  telling  for  twenty  minutes.  Of  course,  no 
woman  likes  to  lose  a  lover,  no  matter  what  she 
may  say  about  it,  but  Jim  had  been  getting  on  my 
nerves  for  some  time,  and  I  was  much  calmer  than 
he  expected  me  to  be. 

"If  you  mean,"  I  said  finally  in  desperation,  "that 
you  and  Bella  are — are  in  love,  why  don't  you  say 
so,  Jim?  I  think  you  will  find  that  I  stand  it  won 
derfully." 

He  brightened  perceptibly. 

"I  didn't  know  how  you  would  take  it,  Kit/'  he 
said,  "and  I  hope  we  will  always  be  bully  friends. 
You  are  absolutely  sure  you  don't  care  a  whoop  for 
me?" 

"Absolutely,"  I  replied,  and  we  shook  hands  on  it. 
Then  he  began  about  Bella ;  it  was  very  tiresome. 

Bella  is  a  nice  girl,  but  I  had  roomed  with  her  at 
school,  and  I  was  under  no  illusions.  When  Jim 
raved  about  Bella  and  her  banjo,  and  Bella  and  her 
guitar,  I  had  painful  moments  when  I  recalled  Bella 
learning  her  two  songs  on  each  instrument,  and  the 
old  English  ballad  she  had  learned  to  play  on  the 

5 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

harp.  When  he  said  she  was  too  good  for  him,  I 
never  batted  an  eye.  And  I  shook  hands  solemnly 
across  the  tea-table  again,  and  wished  him  happiness 
— which  was  sincere  enough,  but  hopeless — and  said 
we  had  only  been  playing  a  game,  but  that  it  was 
time  to  stop  playing.  Jim  kissed  my  hand,  and  it 
was  really  very  touching. 

We  had  been  the  best  of  friends  ever  since.  Two 
days  before  the  wedding  he  came  around  from  his 
tailor's,  and  we  burned  all  his  letters  to  me.  He 
would  read  one  and  say:  "Here's  a  crackerjack. 
Kit,"  and  pass  it  to  me.  And  after  I  had  read  it  we 
would  lay  it  on  the  firelog,  and  Jim  would  say 
"I  am  not  worthy  of  her,  Kit.  I  wonder  if  I  car 
make  her  happy?"  Or — "Did  you  know  that  the 
Duke  of  Belford  proposed  to  her  in  London  lasl 
winter?" 

Of  course,  one  has  to  take  the  woman's  wore 
about  a  thing  like  that,  but  the  Duke  of  Belford  hac 
been  mad  about  Maude  Richard  all  that  winter. 

You  can  see  that  the  burning  of  the  letters,  whicl 
was  meant  to  be  reminiscently  sentimental,  a  sor 

6 


AT    LEAST   I    MEANT    WELL 

of  how-silly-we-were-but-it-is-all-over-now  occasion, 
became  actually  a  two  hours'  eulogy  of  Bella.  And 
just  when  I  was  bored  to  death,  the  Mercer  girls 
dropped  in  and  heard  Jim  begin  to  read  one  com 
mencing  "dearest  Kit."  And  the  next  day  after  the 
rehearsal  dinner,  they  told  Bella ! 

There  was  very  nearly  no  wedding  at  all.  Bella 
came  to  see  me  in  a  frenzy  the  next  morning  and 
threw  Jim  and  his  two  hundred  odd  pounds  in  my 
face,  and  although  I  explained  it  all  over  and  over, 
she  never  quite  forgave  me.  That  was  what  made 
it  so  hard  later — the  situation  would  have  been  bad 
enough  without  that  complication. 

They  went  abroad  on  their  wedding  journey,  and 
stayed  several  months.  And  when  Jim  came  back 
he  was  fatter  than  ever.  Everybody  noticed  it. 
Bella  had  a  gymnasium  fitted  up  in  a  corner  of  the 
studio,  but  he  would  not  use  it.  He  smoked  a  pipe 
and  painted  all  day,  and  drank  beer  and  would  eat 
starches  or  whatever  it  is  that  is  fattening.  But  he 
adored  Bella,  and  he  was  madly  jealous  of  her.  At 
dinners  he  used  to  glare  at  the  man  who  took  her  in, 

7 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

although  it  did  not  make  him  thin.  Bella  was  flirt 
ing,  too,  and  by  the  time  they  had  been  married  a 
year,  people  hitched  their  chairs  together  and 
dropped  their  voices  when  they  were  mentioned. 

Well,  on  the  anniversary  of  the  day  Bella  left  him 
— oh,  yes,  she  left  him  finally.  She  was  intense 
enough  about  some  things,  and  she  said  it  got  on  her 
nerves  to  have  everybody  chuckle  when  they  asked 
for  her  husband.  They  would  say,  "Hello,  Bella! 
How's  Bubbles?  Still  banting?"  And  Bella  would 
try  to  laugh  and  say,  "He  swears  his  tailor  says  his 
waist  is  smaller,  but  if  it  is  he  must  be  growing 
hollow  in  the  back."  But  she  got  tired  of  it  at  last. 
Well,  on  the  second  anniversary  of  Bella's  depart 
ure,  Jimmy  was  feeling  pretty  glum,  and  as  I  say, 
I  am  very  fond  of  Jim.  The  divorce  had  just  gone 
through  and  Bella  had  taken  her  maiden  name  again 
and  had  had  an  operation  for  appendicitis.  We  heard 
afterward  that  they  didn't  find  an  appendix,  and 
that  the  one  they  showed  her  in  a  glass  jar  was  not 
hers!  But  if  Bella  ever  suspected,  she  didn't  say. 
Whether  the  appendix  was  anonymous  or  not,  she 

8 


SHE  GOT  BOX  AFTER  BOX  OF  FLOWERS 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

got  box  after  box  of  flowers  that  were,  and  of 
course  every  one  knew  that  it  was  Jim  who  sent 
them. 

To  go  back  to  the  anniversary;  I  went  to  Roth- 
berg's  to  see  the  collection  of  antique  furniture — 
mother  was  looking  for  a  sideboard  for  father's 
birthday  in  March — and  I  met  Jimmy  there,  boring 
into  a  worm-hole  in  a  seventeenth-century  bedpost 
with  the  end  of  a  match,  and  looking  his  nearest  to 
sad.  When  he  saw  me  he  came  over. 

"I'm  blue  to-day,  Kit,"  he  said,  after  we  had 
shaken  hands.  "Come  and  help  me  dig  bait,  and 
then  let's  go  fishing.  If  there's  a  worm  in  every 
hole  in  that  bedpost,  we  could  go  into  the  fish  busi 
ness.  It's  a  good  business." 

"Better  than  painting?"  I  asked.  But  he  ignored 
my  gibe  and  swelled  up  alarmingly  in  order  to  sigh. 

"This  is  the  worst  day  of  the  year  for  me,"  he 
affirmed,  staring  straight  ahead,  "and  the  longest. 
Look  at  that  crazy  clock  over  there.  If  you  want  to 
see  your  life  passing  away,  if  you  want  to  see  the 
steps  by  which  you  are  marching  to  eternity,  watch 

10 


AT    LEAST    I    MEANT    WELL 

that  clock  marking  the  time.  Look  at  that  infernal 
hand  staying  quiet  for  sixty  seconds  and  then  jump 
ing  forward  to  catch  up  with  the  procession.  Ugh !" 
"See  here,  Jim,"  I  said,  leaning  forward,  "you're 
not  well.  You  can't  go  through  the  rest  of  the  day 
like  this.  I  know  what  you'll  do :  you'll  go  home  to 
play  Grieg  on  the  pianola,  and  you  won't  eat  any 
dinner."  He  looked  guilty. 

"Not  Grieg,"  he  protested  feebly.     "Beethoven." 
"You're  not  going  to  do  either,"!  said  with  firm 
ness.     "You  are  going  right  home  to  unpack  those 
new  draperies  that   Harry  Bayles  sent  you  from 

»  Shanghai,  and  you  are  going  to  order  dinner  for 
eight — that  will  be  two  tables  of  bridge.  And  you 
are  not  going  to  touch  the  pianola." 

(He  did  not  seem  enthusiastic,  but  he  rose  and 
picked  up  his  hat,  and  stood  looking  down  at  me 
where  I  sat  on  an  old  horse-hair  covered  sofa. 

"I  wish  to  thunder  I  had  married  you!"  he  said 
savagely.  "You're  the  finest  girl  I  know,  Kit,  with- 

»out  exception,  and  you  are  going  to  throw  yourself 
away  on  Jack  Manning,  or  Max,  or  some  other — " 

II 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Nothing  of  the  sort,"  I  said  coldly,  "and  the  fact 
that  you  didn't  marry  me  does  not  give  you  the  privi 
lege  of  abusing  my  friends.  Anyhow,  I  don't  like 
you  when  you  speak  like  that." 

Jim  took  me  to  the  door  and  stopped  there  to  sigh. 

"I  haven't  been  well,"  he  said  heavily.  "Don't 
eat,  don't  sleep.  Wouldn't  you  think  I'd  lose  flesh? 
Kit" — he  lowered  his  voice  solemnly — "I  have 
gained  two  pounds !" 

I  said  he  didn't  look  it,  which  appeared  to  com 
fort  him  somewhat,  and,  because  we  were  old 
friends,  I  asked  him  where  Bella  was.  He  said  he 
thought  she  was  in  Europe,  and  that  he  had  heard 
she  was  going  to  marry  Reggie  Wolfe.  Then  he 
sighed  again,  muttered  something  about  ordering 
the  funeral  baked  meats  to  be  prepared  and  left  me. 

That  was  my  entire  share  in  the  affair.  I  was  the 
victim,  both  of  circumstances  and  of  their  plot, 
which  was  mad  on  the  face  of  it.  During  the  en 
tire  time  they  never  once  let  me  forget  that  /  got 
up  the  dinner,  that  7  telephoned  around  for  them. 
They  asked  me  why  I  couldn't  cook — when  not  one 


BORING  INTO  A  WORM-HOLE  IN  A  SEVENTEENTH- 
CENTURY   BEDPOST 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

of  them  knew  one  side  of  a  range  from  the  other. 
And  for  Anne  Brown  to  talk  the  way  she  did — say 
ing  I  had  always  been  crazy  about  Jim,  and  that 
she  believed  I  had  known  all  along  that  his  aunt  was 
coming — for  Anne  to  talk  like  that  was  sheer  idiocy. 
Yes,  there  was  an  aunt.  The  Japanese  butler  started 
the  trouble,  and  Aunt  Selina  carried  it  along. 


14 


CHAPTER  II 

THE    WAY   IT    BEGAN 

IT  makes  me  angry  every  time  I 
think  how  I  tried  to  make  that  din 
ner  a  success.  I  canceled  a  theater  en 
gagement,  and  I  took  the  Mercer  girls  in 
the  electric  brougham  father  had  given  me 
for  Christmas.  Their  chauffeur  had  been 
gone  for  hours  with  their  machine,  and  they 
had  telephoned  all  the  police  stations  without 
success.  They  were  afraid  that  there  had  been  an 
awful  smash;  they  could  easily  have  replaced  Bart- 
lett,  as  Lollie  said,  but  it  takes  so  long  to  get  new 
parts  for  those  foreign  cars. 

Jim  had  a  house  well  up-town,  and  it  stood  just 
enough  apart  from  the  other  houses  to  be  entirely 
maddening  later.  It  was  a  three-story  affair,  with 
a  basement  kitchen  and  servants'  dining-room. 
Then,  of  course,  there  were  cellars,  as  we  found  out 

15 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

afterward.  On  the  first  floor  there  was  a  large 
square  hall,  a  formal  reception-room,  behind  it  a  big 
living-room  that  was  also  a  library,  then  a  den,  and 
back  of  all  a  Georgian  dining-room,  with  windows 
high  above  the  ground.  On  the  top  floor  Jim  had  a 
studio,  like  every  other  one  I  ever  saw — perhaps  a 
little  mussier.  Jim  was  really  a  grind  at  his  paint 
ing,  and  there  were  cigarette  ashes  and  palette 
knives  and  buffalo  rugs  and  shields  everywhere.  It 
is  strange,  but  when  I  think  of  that  terrible  house, 
I  always  see  the  halls,  enormous,  covered  with 
heavy  rugs,  and  stairs  that  would  have  taken  six 
housemaids  to  keep  in  proper  condition.  I  dream 
about  those  stairs,  stretching  above  me  in  a  Jacob's 
ladder  of  shining  wood  and  Persian  carpets,  going 
up,  up,  clear  to  the  roof. 

The  Dallas  Browns  walked;  they  lived  in  the 
next  block.  And  they  brought  with  them  a  man 
named  Harbison,  that  no  one  knew.  Anne  said  he 
would  be  great  sport,  because  he  was  terribly  seri 
ous,  and  had  the  most  exaggerated  ideas  of  society, 
and  loathed  extravagance,  and  built  bridges  or 

16 


THEY  BROUGHT  WITH  THEM  A  MAN 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

something.  She  had  put  away  her  cigarettes  since 
he  had  been  with  them — he  and  Dallas  had  been  col 
lege  friends — and  the  only  chance  she  had  to  smoke 
was  when  she  was  getting  her  hair  done.  And  she 
had  singed  off  quite  a  lot — a  burnt  offering,  she 
called  it. 

"My  dear/'  she  said  over  the  telephone,  when  I 
invited  her,  "I  want  you  to  know  him.  He'll  be 
crazy  about  you.  That  type  of  man,  big  and  deadly 
earnest,  always  falls  in  love  with  your  type  of  girl, 
the  appealing  sort,  you  know.  And  he  has  been  too 
busy,  up  to  now,  to  know  what  love  is.  But  mind, 
don't  hurt  him :  he's  a  dear  boy.  I'm  half  in  love 
with  him  myself,  and  Dallas  trots  around  at  his 
heels  like  a  poodle." 

But  all  Anne's  geese  are  swans,  so  I  thought  little 
of  the  Harbison  man  except  to  hope  that  he  played 
respectable  bridge,  and  wouldn't  mark  the  cards 
with  a  steel  spring  under  his  finger  nail,  as  one  of 
her  "finds"  had  done. 

We  all  arrived  about  the  same  time,  and  Anne 
and  I  went  up-stairs  together  to  take  off  our  wraps 

18 


THE   WAY   IT    BEGAN 

in  what  had  been  Bella's  dressing-room.  It  was 
Anne  who  noticed  the  violets. 

"Look  at  that!"  she  nudged  me,  when  the  maid 
was  examining  her  wrap  before  she  laid  it  down. 
"What  did  I  tell  you,  Kit?  He's  still  quite  mad 
about  her." 

Jim  had  painted  Bella's  portrait  while  they  were 
going  up  the  Nile  on  their  wedding-trip.  It  looked 
quite  like  her,  if  you  stood  well  off  in  the  middle  of 
the  room  and  if  the  light  came  from  the  right.  And 
just  beneath  it,  in  a  silver  vase,  was  a  bunch  of  vio 
lets.  It  was  really  touching,  and  violets  were  fabu 
lous.  It  made  me  want  to  cry,  and  to  shake  Bella 
soundly,  and  to  go  down  and  pat  Jim  on  his  gener 
ous  shoulder,  and  tell  him  what  a  good  fellow  I 
thought  him,  and  that  Bella  wasn't  worth  the  dust 
under  his  feet.  I  don't  know  much  about  psychol 
ogy,  but  it  would  be  interesting  to  know  just  what 
effect  those  violets  and  my  sympathy  for  Jim  had  in 
influencing  my  decision  a  half-hour  later.  It  is  not 
surprising,  under  the  circumstances,  that  for  some 
time  after  the  odor  of  violets  made  me  ill. 

19 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

We  all  met  down-stairs  in  the  living-room,  quite 
informally,  and  Dallas  was  banging  away  at  the 
pianola,  tramping  the  pedals  with  the  delicacy  and 
feeling  of  a  foot-ball  center-rush  kicking  a  goal. 
Mr.  Harbison  was  standing  near  the  fire,  a  little 
away  from  the  others,  and  he  was  all  that  Anne  had 
said  and  more  in  appearance.  He  was  tall — not 
too  tall,  and  very  straight.  And  after  one  got  past 
the  oddity  of  his  face  being  bronze-colored  above  his 
white  collar,  and  of  his  brown  hair  being  sun- 
bleached  on  top  until  it  was  almost  yellow,  one  real 
ized  that  he  was  very  handsome.  He  had  what  one 
might  call  a  resolute  nose  and  chin,  and  a  pleasant, 
rather  humorous,  mouth.  And  he  had  blue  eyes  that 
were,  at  that  moment,  wandering  with  interest  over 
the  lot  of  us.  Somebody  shouted  his  name  to  me 
above  the  Tristan  and  Isolde  music,  and  I  held  out 
my  hand. 

Instantly  I  had  the  feeling  one  sometimes  has,  of 
having  done  just  that  same  thing,  with  the  same 
surroundings,  in  the  same  place,  years  before.  I  was 
looking  up  at  him,  and  he  was  staring  down  at  me 

20 


THE  ONLY  CHANCE  SHE  HAD  TO  SMOKE 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

and  holding  my  hand.    And  then  the  music  stopped 
and  he  was  saying : 

"Where  was  it?" 

"Where  was  what?"  I  asked.  The  feeling  was 
stronger  than  ever  with  his  voice. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said,  and  let  my  hand 
drop.  "Just  for  a  second  I  had  an  idea  that  we  had 
met  before  somewhere,  a  long  time  ago.  I  suppose 
— no,  it  couldn't  have  happened,  or  I  should  remem 
ber."  He  was  smiling,  half  at  himself. 

"No,"  I  smiled  back  at  him.  "It  didn't  happen, 
I'm  afraid — unless  we  dreamed  it." 

"We?" 

"I  felt  that  way,  too,  for  a  moment." 

"The  Brushwood  Boy!"  he  said  with  conviction. 
"Perhaps  we  will  find  a  common  dream  life,  where 
we  knew  each  other.  You  remember  the  Brush 
wood  Boy  loved  the  girl  for  years  before  they  really 
met."  But  this  was  a  little  too  rapid,  even  for  me. 

"Nothing  so  sentimental,  I'm  afraid,"  I  retorted. 
"I  have  had  exactly  the  same  sensation  sometimes 
when  I  have  sneezed." 

22 


THE    WAY    IT    BEGAN 

Betty  Mercer  captured  him  then  and  took  him  off 
to  see  Jim's  newest  picture.  Anne  pounced  on  me 
at  once. 

"Isn't  he  delicious?"  she  demanded.  "Did  you 
ever  see  such  shoulders?  And  such  a  nose?  And 
he  thinks  we  are  parasites,  cumberers  of  the  earth, 
Heaven  knows  what.  He  says  every  woman  ought 
to  know  how  to  earn  her  living,  in  case  of  necessity ! 
I  said  I  could  make  enough  at  bridge,  and  he 
thought  I  was  joking !  He's  a  dear !"  Anne  was  en 
thusiastic. 

I  looked  after  him.  Oddly  enough  the  feeling 
that  we  had  met  before  stuck  to  me.  Which  was 
ridiculous,  of  course,  for  we  learned  afterward  that 
the  nearest  we  ever  came  to  meeting  was  that  our 
mothers  had  been  school  friends!  Just  then  I  saw 
Jim  beckoning  to  me  crazily  from  the  den.  He 
looked  quite  yellow,  and  he  had  been  running  his 
fingers  through  his  hair. 

"For  Heaven's  sake,  come  in,  Kit !"  he  said.  "I 
need  a  cool  head.  Didn't  I  tell  you  this  is  my  calam 
ity  day?" 

23 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Cook  gone?"  I  asked  with  interest.  I  was  starv 
ing. 

He  closed  the  door  and  took  up  a  tragic  attitude 
in  front  of  the  fire.  "Did  you  ever  hear  of  Aunt 
Selina?"  he  demanded. 

"I  knew  there  was  one,"  I  ventured,  mindful  of 
certain  gossip  as  to  whence  Jimmy  derived  the  Wil 
son  income. 

Jim  himself  was  too  worried  to  be  cautious.  He 
waved  a  brazen  hand  at  the  snug  room,  at  the  Jap 
anese  prints  on  the  walls,  at  the  rugs,  at  the  teak- 
wood  cabinets  and  the  screen  inlaid  with  pearl  and 
ivory. 

"All  this,"  he  said  comprehensively,  "every  bite 
I  eat,  clothes  I  wear,  drinks  I  drink — you  needn't 
look  like  that ;  I  don't  drink  so  darned  much — every 
thing  comes  from  Aunt  Selina — buttons,"  he  fin 
ished  with  a  groan. 

"Selina  Buttons,"  I  said  reflectively.  "I  don't  re 
member  ever  having  known  any  one  named  Buttons, 
although  I  had  a  cat  once — 

"Damn  the  cat!"  he  said  rudely.  "Her  name  isn't 
24 


THE    WAY    IT    BEGAN 

Buttons.  Her  name  is  Caruthers,  my  Aunt  Selina 
Caruthers,  and  the  money  comes  from  buttons." 

"Oh!"  feebly. 

"It's  an  old  business,"  he  went  on,  with  some 
thing  of  proprietary  pride.  "My  grandfather 
founded  it  in  1775.  Made  buttons  for  the  Conti 
nental  Army." 

"Oh,  yes,"  I  said.  "They  melted  the  buttons  to 
make  bullets,  didn't  they?  Or  they  melted  bullets 
to  make  buttons?  Which  was  it?" 

But  again  he  interrupted. 

"It's  like  this,"  he  went  on  hurriedly.  "Aunt 
Selina  believes  in  me.  She  likes  pictures,  and  she 
wanted  me  to  paint,  if  I  could.  I'd  have  given  up 
long  ago — oh,  I  know  what  you  think  of  my  work — 
but  for  Aunt  Selina.  She  has  encouraged  me,  and 
she's  done  more  than  that;  she's  paid  the  bills." 

"Dear  Aunt  Selina,"  I  breathed. 

"When  I  got  married,"  Jim  persisted,  "Aunt  Se 
lina  doubled  my  allowance.  I  always  expected  to 
sell  something,  an'i  begin  to  make  money,  and  in 
the  meantime  what  she  advanced  I  considered  as  a 


li ilJ 

1  I- 


EVERYTHING   COMES   FROM   f  UNT  SELINA 


THE   WAY   IT    BEGAN 

loan."  He  was  eying  me  defiantly,  but  I  was  grow 
ing  serious.  It  was  evident  from  the  preamble  that 
something  was  coming. 

"To  understand,  Kit,"  he  went  on  dubiously,  "you 
would  have  to  know  her.  She  won't  stand  for 
divorce.  She  thinks  it  is  a  crime." 

"What!"  I  sat  up.  I  have  always  regarded  di 
vorce  as  essentially  disagreeable,  like  castor  oil,  but 
necessary. 

"Oh,  you  know  well  enough  what  I'm  driving 
at,"  he  burst  out  savagely.  "She  doesn't  know 
Bella  has  gone.  She  thinks  I  am  living  in  a  little 
domestic  heaven,  and — she  is  coming  to-night  to 
hear  me  flap  my  wings." 

"To-night!" 

I  don't  think  Jimmy  had  known  that  Dallas 
Brown  had  come  in  and  was  listening.  I  am  sure 
I  had  not.  Hearing  his  chuckle  at  the  doorway 
brought  us  up  with  a  jerk. 

"Where  has  Aunt  Selina  been  for  the  last  two  or 
three  years  ?"  he  asked  easily. 

Jim  turned,  and  his  face  brightened. 
27 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

"Europe.  Look  here,  Dal,  you're  a  smart  chap. 
She'll  only  be  here  about  four  hours.  Can't  you 
think  of  some  way  to  get  me  out  of  this?  I  want 
to  let  her  down  easy,  too.  I'm  mighty  fond  of 
Aunt  Selina.  Can't  we — can't  I  say  Bella  has  a 
headache ?" 

"Rotten !"  laconically. 

"Gone  out  of  town?''  Jim  was  desperate. 

"And  you  with  a  houseful  of  dinner  guests !  Try 
again,  Jim." 

"I  have  it,"  Jim  said  suddenly.  "Dallas,  ask 
Anne  if  she  won't  play  hostess  for  to-night.  Be 
Mrs.  Wilson  pro  tern.  Anne  would  love  it.  Aunt 
Selina  never  saw  Bella.  Then,  afterward,  next 
year,  when  I'm  hung  in  the  Academy  and  can  stand 
on  my  feet" — ("Not  if  you're  hung,"  Dallas  inter 
jected.)— "I'll  break  the  truth  to  her." 

But  Dallas  was  not  enthusiastic. 

"Anne  wouldn't  do  at  all,"  he  declared.  "She'd 
be  talking  about  the  kids  before  she  knew  it,  and 
patting  me  on  the  head."  He  said  it  complacently; 
Anne  flirts,  but  they  are  really  devoted. 

28 


THE   WAY    IT   BEGAN 

"One  of  the  Mercer  girls?"  I  suggested,  but 
Jimmy  raised  a  horrified  hand. 

"You  don't  know  Aunt  Selina,"  he  protested.  "I 
couldn't  offer  Leila  in  the  gown  she's  got  on,  unless 
she  wore  a  shawl,  and  Betty  is  too  fair." 

Anne  came  in  just  then,  and  the  whole  story  had 
to  be  told  again  to  her.  She  was  ecstatic.  She  said 
it  was  good  enough  for  a  play,  and  that  of  course  she 
would  be  Mrs.  Jimmy  for  that  length  of  time. 

"You  know,"  she  finished,  "if  it  were  not  for  Dal, 
I  would  be  Mrs.  Jimmy  for  any  length  of  time. 
I  have  been  devoted  to  you  for  years,  Billiken." 

But  Dallas  refused  peremptorily. 

"I'm  not  jealous,"  he  explained,  straightening  and 
throwing  out  his  chest,  "but — well,  you  don't  look 
the  part,  Anne.  You're — you  are  growing  ma 
tronly,  not  but  what  you  suit  me  all  right.  And 
then  I'd  forget  and  call  you  'mammy,'  which  would 
require  explanation.  I  think  it's  up  to  you,  Kit." 

"I  shall  lo  nothing  of  the  sort !"  I  snapped.  "It's 
ridiculous  " 

"I  dare  you!"  said  Dallas. 
29 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

I  refused.  I  stood  like  a  rock  while  the  storm 
surged  around  me  and  beat  over  me.  I  must  say  for 
Jim  that  he  was  merely  pathetic.  He  said  that  my 
happiness  was  first;  that  he  would  not  give  me  an 
uncomfortable  minute  for  anything  on  earth;  and 
that  Bella  had  been  perfectly  right  to  leave  him, 
because  he  was  a  sinking  ship,  and  deserved  to  be 
turned  out  penniless  into  the  world.  After  which 
mixed  figure,  he  poured  himself  something  to  drink, 
and  his  hands  were  shaking. 

Dal  and  Anne  stood  on  each  side  of  him  and 
patted  him  on  the  shoulders,  and  glared  across  at  me. 
I  felt  that  if  I  was  a  rock,  Jim's  ship  had  struck  on 
me  and  was  sinking,  as  he  said,  because  of  me.  I 
began  to  crumble. 

"What — what  time  does  she  leave?''  I  asked,  wav 
ering. 

"Ten :  nine;  Kit,  are  you  going  to  do  it?" 

"No!"  I  gave  a  last  clutch  at  my  resolution. 
"People  who  do  that  kind  of  thing  always  get  into 
trouble.  She  might  miss  her  train.  Si  e's  almost 
certain  to  miss  her  train." 

30 


THE   WAY   IT   BEGAN 

"You're  temporizing,"  Dallas  said  sternly.  "We 
won't  let  her  miss  her  train;  you  can  be  sure  of 
that." 

"Jim,"  Anne  broke  in  suddenly,  "hasn't  she  a  pic 
ture  of  Bella  ?  There's  not  the  faintest  resemblance 
between  Bella  and  Kit." 

Jim  became  downcast  again.  "I  sent  her  a  minia 
ture  of  Bella  a  couple  of  years  ago,"  he  said  de 
spondently.  "Did  it  myself." 

But  Dal  said  he  remembered  the  miniature,  and  it 
looked  more  like  me  than  Bella,  anyhow.  So  we 
were  just  where  we  started.  And  down  inside  of  me 
I  had  a  premonition  that  I  was  going  to  do  just  what 
they  wanted  me  to  do,  and  get  into  all  sorts  of  trou 
ble,  and  not  be  thanked  for  it  after  all.  Which  was 
entirely  correct.  And  then  Leila  Mercer  came  and 
banged  at  the  door  and  said  that  dinner  had  been  an 
nounced  ages  ago  and  that  everybody  was  famish 
ing.  With  the  hurry  and  stress,  and  poor  Jim's  dis 
tracted  face,  I  weakened. 

"I  feel  like  a  cross  between  an  idiot  and  a  crimi 
nal,"  I  said  shortly,  "and  I  don't  know  particularly 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

why  every  one  thinks  I  should  be  the  victim  for  the 
sacrifice.  But  if  you  will  promise  to  get  her  off 
early  to  her  train,  and  if  you  will  stand  by  me  and 
not  leave  me  alone  with  her,  I — I  might  try  it." 

"Of  course,  we'll  stand  by  you !"  they  said  in 
chorus.  "We  won't  let  you  stick!"  And  Dal 
said,  "You're  the  right  sort  of  girl,  Kit.  And  after 
it's  all  over,  you'll  realize  that  it's  the  biggest  kind 
of  lark.  Think  how  you  are  saving  the  old  lady's 
feelings!  When  you  are  an  elderly  person  your 
self,  Kit,  you  will  appreciate  what  you  are  doing 
to-night." 

Yes,  they  said  they  would  stand  by  me,  and  that 
I  was  a  heroine  and  the  only  person  there  clever 
enough  to  act  the  part,  and  that  they  wouldn't  let  me 
stick !  I  am  not  bitter  now,  but  that  is  what  they 
promised.  Oh,  I  am  not  defending  myself;  I  sup 
pose  I  deserved  everything  that  happened.  But 
they  told  me  that  she  would  be  there  only  between 
trains,  and  that  she  was  deaf,  and  that  I  had  an  op 
portunity  to  save  a  fellow-being  from  ruin.  So  in 
the  end  I  capitulated. 

32 


THE   WAY    IT    BEGAN 

When  they  opened  the  door  into  the  living-room, 
Max  Reed  had  arrived  and  was  helping  to  hide  a 
decanter  and  glasses,  and  somebody  said  a  cab  was 
at  the  door. 

And  that  was  the  way  it  began. 


33 


CHAPTER    III 

I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

THE  minute  I  had  consented  I  re 
gretted  it.  After  all,  what  were 
Jimmy's  troubles  to  me?  Why 
should  I  help  him  impose  on  an 
unsuspecting  elderly  woman  ? 
nd  it  was  only  putting  off  dis 
covery  anyhow.  Sooner  or  later, 
she  would  learn  of  the  divorce,  and —  Just 
at  that  instant  my  eyes  fell  on  Mr.  Harbison — Tom 
Harbison,  as  Anne  called  him.  He  was  looking  on 
with  an  amused,  half-puzzled  smile,  while  people 
were  rushing  around  hiding  the  roulette  wheel  and 
things  of  which  Miss  Caruthers  might  disapprove, 
and  Betty  Mercer  was  on  her  knees  winding  up  a  toy 
bear  that  Max  had  brought  her.  What  would  he 
think?  It  was  evident  that  he  thought  badly  of  us 
already — that  he  was  contemptuously  amused,  and 

34 


RUSHING  AROUND  HIDING  THE  ROULETTE  WHEEL  AND  THINGS 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

then  to  have  to  ask  him  to  lend  himself  to  the  de 
ception  ! 

With  a  gasp  I  hurled  myself  after  Jimmy,  only  to 
hear  a  strange  voice  in  the  hall  and  to  know  that  I 
was  too  late.  I  was  in  for  it,  whatever  was  coming. 
It  was  Aunt  Selina  who  was  coming — along  the 
hall,  followed  by  Jim,  who  was  mopping  his  face  and 
trying  not  to  notice  the  paralyzed  silence  in  the 
library. 

Aunt  Selina  met  me  in  the  doorway.  To  my 
frantic  eyes  she  seemed  to  tower  above  us  by  at  least 
a  foot,  and  beside  her  Jimmy  was  a  red,  perspiring 
cherub. 

"Here  she  is/'  Jimmy  said,  from  behind  a  tem 
porary  eclipse  of  black  cloak  and  traveling  bag.  He 
was  on  top  of  the  situation  now,  and  he  was  menda 
ciously  cheerful.  He  had  not  said,  "Here  is  my 
wife."  That  would  have  been  a  lie.  No,  Jimmy 
merely  said,  "Here  she  is."  If  Aunt  Selina  chose  to 
think  me  Bella,  was  it  not  her  responsibility?  And 
if  I  chose  to  accept  the  situation,  was  it  not  mine? 
Dallas  Brown  came  forward  gravely  as  Aunt  Selina 

36 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

folded  over  and  kissed  me,  and  surreptitiously  pat 
ted  me  with  one  hand  while  he  held  out  the  other  to 
Miss  Caruthers.  I  loathed  him ! 

"We  always  expect  something  unusual  from 
James,  Miss  Caruthers,"  he  said,  with  his  best  man 
ner,  "but  this — this  is  beyond  our  wildest  dreams." 

Well,  it's  too  awful  to  linger  over.  Anne  took 
her  up-stairs  and  into  Bella's  bedroom.  It  was  a 
fancy  of  Jim's  to  leave  that  room  just  as  Bella  had 
left  it,  dusty  dance  cards  and  favors  hanging  around 
and  a  pair  of  discarded  slippers  under  the  bed.  I 
don't  think  it  had  been  swept  since  Bella  left  it.  I 
believe  in  sentiment,  but  I  like  it  brushed  and  dusted 
and  the  cobwebs  off  of  it,  and  when  Aunt  Selina  put 
down  her  bonnet,  it  stirred  up  a  gray- white  cloud 
that  made  her  cough.  She  did  not  say  anything,  but 
she  looked  around  the  room  grimly,  and  I  saw  her 
run  her  finger  over  the  back  of  a  chair  before  she  let 
Hannah,  the  maid,  put  her  cloak  on  it. 

Anne  looked  frightened.  She  ran  into  Bella's  bath 
and  wet  the  end  of  a  towel  and  when  Hannah  was 
changing  Aunt  Selina's  collar — her  concession  to 

37 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

evening  dress — Anne  wiped  off  the  obvious  places 
on  the  furniture.  She  did  it  stealthily,  but  Aunt 
Selina  saw  her  in  the  glass. 

"What's  that  young  woman's  name?"  she  asked 
me  sharply,  when  Anne  had  taken  the  towel  out  to 
hide  it. 

"Anne  Brown,  Mrs.  Dallas  Brown,"  I  replied 
meekly.  Every  one  replied  meekly  to  Aunt  Selina. 

"Does  she  live  here?1' 

"Oh,  no,"  I  said  airily.  "They  are  here  to  din 
ner,  she  and  her  husband.  They  are  old  friends  of 
Jim's — and  mine." 

"Seems  to  have  a  good  eye  for  dirt,"  said  Aunt 
Selina  and  went  on  fastening  her  brooch.  When  she 
was  finally  ready,  she  took  a  bead  purse  from  some 
where  about  her  waist  and  took  out  a  half  dollar. 
She  held  it  up  before  Hannah's  eyes. 

"To-morrow  morning,"  she  said  sternly,  "you 
take  off  that  white  cap  and  that  fol-de-rol  apron  and 
that  black  henrietta  cloth,  and  put  on  a  calico  wrap 
per.  And  when  you've  got  this  room  aired  and 
swept,  Mrs.  Wilson  will  give  you  this." 

38 


"  HERE  SHE  IS,"  JIMMY  SAID 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Hannah  took  two  steps  back  and  caught  hold  of  a 
chair;  she  stared  helplessly  from  Aunt  Selina  to  the 
half  dollar,  and  then  at  me.  Anne  was  trying  not  to 
catch  my  eye. 

"And  another  thing/'  Aunt  Selina  said,  from  the 
head  of  the  stairs,  "I  sent  those  towels  over  from 
Ireland.  Tell  her  to  wash  and  bleach  the  one  Mrs. 
What's-her-name  Brown  used  as  a  duster." 

Anne  was  quite  crushed  as  \ve  went  down  the 
stairs.  I  turned  once,  half-way  down,  and  her  face 
was  a  curious  mixture  of  guilt  and  hopeless  wrath. 
Over  her  shoulder,  I  could  see  Hannah,  wide-eyed 
and  puzzled,  staring  after  us. 

Jim  presented  everybody,  and  then  he  went  into 
the  den  and  closed  the  door  and  we  heard  him  unlock 
the  cellarette.  Aunt  Selina  looked  at  Leila's  bare 
shoulders  and  said  she  guessed  she  didn't  take  cold 
easily,  and  conversation  rather  languished.  Max 
Reed  was  looking  like  a  thundercloud,  and  he  came 
over  to  me  with  a  lowering  expression  that  I  had 
learned  to  dread  in  him. 

"What  fool  nonsense  is  this?"  he  demanded. 
40 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

"What  in  the  world  possessed  you,  Kit,  to  put  your 
self  in  such  an  equivocal  position?  Unless'* — he 
stopped  and  turned  a  little  white — "unless  you  are 
going  to  marry  Jim." 

I  am  sorry  for  Max.  He  is  such  a  nice  boy,  and 
good  looking,  too,  if  only  he  were  not  so  fierce,  and 
did  not  want  to  make  love  to  me.  No  matter  what 
I  do,  Max  always  disapproves  of  it.  I  have  always 
had  a  deeply  rooted  conviction  that  if  I  should  ever 
in  a  weak  moment  marry  Max,  he  would  disapprove 
of  that,  too,  before  I  had  done  it  very  long. 

"Are  you?"  he  demanded,  narrowing  his  eyes — 
a  sign  of  unusually  bad  humor. 

"Am  I  what?" 

"Going  to  marry  him  ?" 

"If  you  mean  Jim,"  I  said  with  dignity,  "I  haven't 
made  up  my  mind  yet.  Besides,  he  hasn't  asked 
me." 

Aunt  Selina  had  been  talking  Woman's  Suffrage 
in  front  of  the  fireplace,  but  now  she  turned  to  me. 

"Is  this  the  vase  Cousin  Jane  Whitcomb  sent  you 
as  a  wedding-present?"  she  demanded,  indicating  a 

41 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

hideous  urn-shaped  affair  on  the  mantel.  It  came  to 
me  as  an  inspiration  that  Jim  had  once  said  it  was  an 
ancestral  urn,  so  I  said  without  hesitation  that  it 
was.  And  because  there  was  a  pause  and  every  one 
was  looking  at  us,  I  added  that  it  was  a  beautiful 
thing. 

Aunt  Selina  sniffed. 

"Hideous!"  she  said.  "It  looks  like  Cousin  Jane, 
shape  and  coloring." 

Then  she  looked  at  it  more  closely,  pounced  on  it, 
turned  it  upside  down  and  shook  it.  A  card  fell  out, 
which  Dallas  picked  up  and  gave  her  with  a  bow. 
Jim  had  come  out  of  the  den  and  was  dancing  wildly 
around  and  beckoning  to  me.  By  the  time  I  had 
made  out  that  that  was  not  the  vase  Cousin  Jane  had 
sent  us  as  a  wedding-present,  Aunt  Selina  had  exam 
ined  the  card.  Then  she  glared  across  at  me  and, 
stooping,  put  the  card  in  the  fire.  I  did  not  under 
stand  at  all,  but  I  knew  I  had  in  some  way  done  the 
unforgivable  thing.  Later,  Dal  told  me  it  was  her 
card,  and  that  she  had  sent  the  vase  to  Jim  at  Christ 
mas,  with  a  generous  check  inside.  When  she 

42 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

straightened  from  the  fireplace,  it  was  to  a  new 
theme,  which  she  attacked  with  her  usual  vigor.  The 
vase  incident  was  over,  but  she  never  forgot  it.  She 
proved  that  she  never  did  when  she  sent  me  two 
urn-shaped  vases  with  Paul  and  Virginia  on  them, 
when  I — that  is,  later  on. 

"The  Cause  in  England  has  made  great  strides," 
she  announced  from  the  fireplace.  "Soon  the  hand 
that  rocks  the  cradle  will  be  the  hand  that  actually 
rules  the  world."  Here  she  looked  at  me. 

"I'm  not  up  on  such  things,"  Max  said  blandly, 
having  recovered  some  of  his  good  humor,  "but — 
isn't  it  usually  a  foot  that  rocks  the  cradle  ?" 

Aunt  Selina  turned  on  him  and  Mr.  Harbison, 
who  were  standing  together,  with  a  snort. 

"What  have  you,  or  you,  ever  done  for  the  inde 
pendence  of  woman?"  she  demanded. 

Mr.  Harbison  smiled.  He  had  been  looking 
rather  grave  until  then.  "We  have  at  least  re 
mained  unmarried,"  he  retorted.  And  then  dinner 
was  again  announced. 

He  was  to  take  me  out,  and  he  came  across  the 

43 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

room  to  where  I  sat  collapsed  in  a  chair,  and  bent 
over  me. 

"Do  you  know/'  he  said,  looking  down  at  me 
with  his  clear,  disconcerting  gaze,  "do  you  know 
that  I  have  just  grasped  the  situation  ?  There  was 
such  a  noise  that  I  did  not  hear  your  name,  and  I  am 
only  realizing  now  that  you  are  my  hostess !  I  don't 
know  why  I  got  the  impression  that  this  was  a 
bachelor  establishment,  but  I  did.  Odd,  wasn't  it?" 

I  positively  couldn't  look  away  from  him.  My 
features  seemed  frozen,  and  my  eyes  were  glued  to 
his.  As  for  telling  him  the  truth — well,  my  tongue 
refused  to  move.  I  intended  to  tell  him  during  din 
ner  if  I  had  an  opportunity :  I  honestly  did.  But  the 
more  I  looked  at  him  and  saw  how  candid  his  eyes 
were,  and  how  stern  his  mouth  might  be,  the  more 
I  shivered  at  the  plunge.  And,  of  course,  as  every 
body  knows  now,  I  didn't  tell  him  at  all.  And  every 
moment  I  expected  that  awful  old  woman  to  ask  me 
what  I  paid  my  cook,  and  when  I  had  changed  the 
color  of  my  hair — Bella's  being  black. 

Dinner  was  a  half-hour  late  when  we  finally  went 
44 


\ 


•; 

j       « 9 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

out,  Jimmy  leading  off  with  Aunt  Selina,  and  I,  as 
hostess,  trailing  behind  the  procession  with  Mr. 
Harbison.  Dallas  took  in  the  two  Mercer  girls,  for 
we  were  one  man  short,  and  Max  took  Anne.  Leila 
Mercer  was  so  excited  that  she  wriggled,  and  as  for 
me,  the  candles  and  the  orchids — everything — 
danced  around  in  a  circle,  and  I  just  seemed  to 
catch  the  back  of  my  chair  as  it  flew  past.  Jim  had 
ordered  away  the  wines  and  brought  out  some  weak 
and  cheap  Chianti.  Dallas  looked  gloomy  at  the 
change,  but  Jiin  explained  in  an  undertone  that 
Aunt  Selina  didn't  approve  of  expensive  vintages. 
Naturally,  the  meal  was  glum  enough. 

Aunt  Selina  had  had  her  dinner  on  the  train, 
so  she  spent  her  time  in  asking  me  questions  the 
length  of  the  table,  and  in  getting  acquainted  with 
me.  She  had  brought  a  bottle  of  some  sort  of  medi 
cine  down-stairs  with  her,  and  she  took  a  claret- 
glassful,  while  she  talked.  The  stuff  was  called  Po 
mona:  shall  I  ever  forget  it? 

It  was  Mr.  Harbison  who  first  noticed  Takahiro. 
Jimmy's  Jap  had  been  the  only  thing  in  the  menage 

45 


.WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

that  Bella  declared  she  had  hated  to  leave.  But  he 
was  doing  the  strangest  things :  his  little  black  eyes 
shifted  nervously,  and  he  looked  queer. 

"What's  wrong  with  him?"  Mr.  Harbison  asked 
me  finally,  when  he  saw  that  I  noticed.  "Is  he  ill?" 

Then  Aunt  Selina's  voice  from  the  other  end  of 
the  table : 

"Bella,"  she  called,  in  a  high  shrill  tone,  "do  you 
let  James  eat  cucumbers?" 

"I  think  he  must  be,"  I  said  hurriedly  aside  to  Mr. 
Harbison.  "See  how  his  hands  shake!"  But  Aunt 
Selina  would  not  be  ignored. 

"Cucumbers  and  strawberries,"  she  repeated  im 
pressively.  "I  was  saying,  Bella,  that  cucumbers 
have  always  given  James  the  most  fearful  indiges 
tion.  And  yet  I  see  you  serve  them  at  your  table. 
Do  you  remember  what  I  wrote  you  to  give  him 
when  he  has  his  dreadful  spells?" 

I  was  quite  speechless;  every  one  was  looking, 
and  no  one  could  help.  It  was  clear  Jim  was  rack 
ing  his  brain,  and  we  sat  staring  desperately  at  each 
other  across  the  candles.  Everything  I  had  ever 


"  I  GOT  THE  IMPRESSION  THAT  THIS  WAS  A  BACHELOR 
ESTABLISHMENT" 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

known  faded  from  me ;  eight  pairs  of  eyes  bored  into 
me,  Mr.  Harbison's  politely  amused. 

"I  don't  remember,"  I  said  at  last.  "Really,  I 
don't  believe — "  Aunt  Selina  smiled  in  a  superior 
way. 

"Now,  don't  you  recall  it?"  she  insisted.  "I  said : 
'Baking  soda  in  water  taken  internally  for  cucum 
bers;  baking  soda  in  water  externally,  rubbed  on, 
when  he  gets  that  dreadful,  itching  strawberry 
rash.'  " 

I  believe  the  dinner  went  on.  Somebody  asked 
Aunt  Selina  how  much  over-charge  she  had  paid  in 
foreign  hotels,  and  after  that  she  was  as  harmless  as 
a  dove. 

Then  half-way  through  the  dinner  we  heard  a 
crash  in  Takahiro's  pantry,  and  when  he  did  not  ap 
pear  again,  Jim  got  up  and  went  out  to  investigate. 
He  was  gone  quite  a  little  while,  and  when  he  came 
back  he  looked  worried. 

"Sick,"  he  replied  to  our  inquiring  glances.  "One 
of  the  maids  will  come  in.  They  have  sent  for  a 
doctor." 

48 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

Aunt  Selina  was  for  going  out  at  once  and  "fix 
ing  him  up/'  as  she  put  it,  but  Dallas  gently  inter 
fered. 

"I  wouldn't,  Miss  Caruthers,"  he  said,  in  the  def 
erential  manner  he  had  adopted  toward  her.  "You 
don't  know  what  it  may  be.  He's  been  looking 
spotty  all  evening." 

"It  might  be  scarlet  fever,"  Max  broke  in  cheer 
fully.  "I  say,  scarlet  fever  on  a  Mongolian — what 
color  would  he  be,  Jimmy?  What  do  yellow  and 
red  make?  Green?" 

"Orange,"  Jim  said  shortly.  "I  wish  you  people 
would  remember  that  we  are  trying  to  eat." 

The  fact  was,  however,  that  no  one  was  really 
eating,  except  Mr.  Harbison,  who  had  given  up  try 
ing  to  understand  us,  considering,  no  doubt,  our  sub 
dued  excitement  as  our  normal  condition.  Ages 
afterward  I  learned  that  he  thought  my  face  almost 
tragic  that  night,  and  that  he  supposed,  from  the 
way  I  glared  across  the  table,  that  I  had  quarreled 
with  my  husband! 

"I  am  afraid  you  are  not  well,"  he  said  at  last, 
49 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

noticing  my  food  untouched  on  my  plate.  "We 
should  not  have  come,  any  of  us." 

"I  am  perfectly  well/'  I  replied  feverishly.  "I  am 
never  ill.  I — I  ate  a  late  luncheon." 

He  glanced  at  me  keenly.  "Don't  let  them  stay 
and  play  bridge  to-night,"  he  urged.  "Miss  Caru- 
thers  can  be  an  excuse,  can  she  not?  And  you  are 
really  fagged.  You  look  it." 

"I  think  it  is  only  ill  humor,"  I  said,  looking  di 
rectly  at  him.  "I  am  angry  at  myself.  I  have  done 
something  silly,  and  I  hate  to  be  silly." 

Max  would  have  said  "Impossible/'  or  something 
else  trite.  The  Harbison  man  looked  at  me  with 
interested,  serious  eyes. 

"Is  it  too  late  to  undo  it?"  he  asked. 

And  then  and  there  I  determined  that  he  should 
never  know  the  truth.  He  could  go  back  to  South 
America  and  build  bridges  and  make  love  to  the 
Spanish  girls  (or  are  they  Spanish  down  there?) 
and  think  of  me  always  as  a  married  woman,  mar 
ried  to  a  dilettante  artist,  inclined  to  be  stout — the 
artist,  not  I — and  with  an  Aunt  Selina  Caruthers 

50 


I    MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

who  made  buttons  and  believed  in  the  Cause.  But 
never,  never  should  he  think  of  me  as  a  silly  little 
fool  who  pretended  that  she  was  the  other  man's 
wife  and  had  a  lump  in  her  throat  because  when  a 
really  nice  man  came  along,  a  man  who  knew  some 
thing  more  than  polo  and  motors,  she  had  to 
carry  on  the  deception  to  keep  his  respect,  and  be 
sedate  and  matronly,  and  see  him  change  from  per 
fectly  open  admiration  at  first  to  a  hands-ofT-she-is- 
my-host's-wife  attitude  at  last. 

"It  can  never  be  undone,"  I  said  soberly. 

Well,  that's  the  picture  as  nearly  as  I  can  draw  it : 
a  round  table  with  a  low  centerpiece  of  orchids  in 
lavenders  and  pink,  old  silver  candlesticks  with  fili 
gree  shades  against  the  somber  wainscoting;  nine 
people,  two  of  them  unhappy — Jim  and  I;  one  of 
them  complacent — Aunt  Selina;  one  puzzled — Mr. 
Harbison;  and  the  rest  hysterically  mirthful.  Add 
one  sick  Japanese  butler  and  grind  in  the  mills  of  the 
gods. 

Every  one  promptly  forgot  Takahiro  in  the  ex 
citement  of  the  game  we  were  all  playing.  Finally, 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

however,  Aunt  Selina,  who  seemed  to  have  Taka- 
hiro  on  her  mind,  looked  up  from  her  plate. 

"That  Jap  was  speckled,"  she  asserted.  "I 
wouldn't  be  surprised  if  it's  measles.  Has  he  been 
sniffling,  James?" 

"Has  he  been  sniffling?"  Jim  threw  across  at  me. 

"I  hadn't  noticed  it,"  I  said  meekly,  while  the  oth 
ers  choked. 

Max  came  to  the  rescue.  "She  refused  to  eat  it," 
he  explained,  distinctly  and  to  everybody,  apropos 
absolutely  of  nothing.  "It  said  on  the  box,  'ready 
cooked  and  predigested.'  She  declared  she  didn't 
care  who  cooked  it,  but  she  wanted  to  know  who  pre- 
digested  it." 

As  every  one  wanted  to  laugh,  every  one  did  it 
then,  and  under  cover  of  the  noise  I  caught  Anne's 
eye,  and  we  left  the  dining-room.  The  men  stayed, 
and  by  the  very  firmness  with  which  the  door  closed 
behind  us,  I  knew  that  Dallas  and  Max  were  bring 
ing  out  the  bottles  that  Takahiro  had  hidden.  I  was 
seething.  When  Aunt  Selina  indicated  a  desire  to 
go  over  the  house  (it  was  natural  that  she  should 

52 


THEY  WERE  POURING  OUT  THINGS  FOR  HIM  AND  SAYING,, 


POOR  OLD  JIM 


I  » 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

want  to :  it  was  her  house,  in  a  way)  I  excused  my 
self  for  a  minute  and  flew  back  to  the  dining-room. 

It  was  as  I  had  expected.  Jim  hadn't  cheered 
perceptibly,  and  the  rest  were  patting  him  on  the 
back,  and  pouring  things  out  for  him,  and  saying, 
"Poor  old  Jim"  in  the  most  maddening  way.  And 
the  Harbison  man  was  looking  more  and  more  puz 
zled,  and  not  at  all  hilarious. 

I  descended  on  them  like  a  thunderbolt. 

"That's  it!"  I  cried  shrewishly,  with  my  back 
against  the  door.  "Leave  her  to  me,  all  of  you,  and 
pat  each  other  on  the  back,  and  say  it's  gone  splen 
didly  !  Oh,  I  know  you,  every  one !"  Mr.  Harbison 
got  up  and  pulled  out  a  chair,  but  I  couldn't  sit :  I 
folded  my  arms  on  the  back.  "After  a  while,  I  sup 
pose,  you'll  slip  up-stairs,  the  four  of  you,  and  have 
your  game."  They  looked  guilty.  "But  I  wrill  block 
that  right  now.  I  am  going  to  stay — here.  If  Aunt 
Selina  wants  me,  she  can  find  me — here !" 

The  first  indication  those  men  had  that  Mr.  Har 
bison  didn't  know  the  state  of  affairs  was  when  he 
turned  and  faced  them. 

54 


I   MIGHT    HAVE    KNOWN    IT 

"Mrs.  Wilson  is  quite  right,"  he  said  gravely. 
"We're  a  selfish  lot.  If  Miss  Caruthers  is  a  respon 
sibility,  let  us  share  her." 

"To  arms !"  Jim  said,  with  an  affectation  of  light 
ness,  as  they  put  their  glasses  down,  and  threw  open 
the  door.  Dai's  retort,  "Whose?"  was  lost  in  the 
confusion,  and  we  went  into  the  library.  On  the  way 
Dallas  managed  to  speak  to  me. 

"If  Harbison  doesn't  know,  don't  tell  him,"  he 
said  in  an  undertone.  "He's  a  queer  duck,  in  some 
ways ;  he  mightn't  think  it  funny." 

"Funny,"  I  choked.  "It's  the  least  funny  thing  I 
ever  experienced.  Deceiving  that  Harbison  man 
isn't  so  bad — he  thinks  me  crazy,  anyhow.  He's 
been  staring  his  eyes  out  at  me — " 

"I  don't  wonder.  You're  really  lovely  to-night, 
Kit,  and  you  look  like  a  vixen." 

"But  to  deceive  that  harmless  old  lady — well, 
thank  goodness,  it's  nine,  and  she  leaves  in  an  hour 


or  so." 


But  she  'didn't.    And  that's  tHe  story. 
55 


CHAPTER    IV 


THE  DOOR    WAS    CLOSED 

IT  was  infuriating  to  see  how 
much  enjoyment  every  one  but 
Jim  and  myself  got  out  of  the 
situation.  They  howled  with 
mirth  over  the  feeblest  jokes, 
and  when  Max  told  a  story 
without  any  point  whatever, 
they  all  had  hysteria.  Imme 
diately  after  dinner  Aunt  Selina  had  begun  on  the 
family  connection  again,  and  after  two  bad  breaks 
on  my  part,  Jim  offered  to  show  her  the  house.  The 
Mercer  girls  trailed  along,  unwilling  to  lose  any  of 
the  possibilities.  They  said  afterward  that  it  was 
terrible :  she  went  into  all  the  closets,  and  ran  her 
hand  over  the  tops  of  doors  and  kept  getting  grim 
mer  and  grimmer.  In  the  studio  they  came  across 
a  life  study  Jim  was  doing  and  she  shut  her  eyes  and 

56 


THE   DOOR    WAS    CLOSED 

made  the  girls  go  out  while  he  covered  it  with  a 
drapery.  Lollie!  Who  did  the  Bacchante  dance  at 
three  benefits  last  winter  and  was  learning  a  new  one 
called  "Eve"! 

When  they  heard  Aunt  Selina  on  the  second  floor, 
Anne,  Dal  and  Max  sneaked  up  to  the  studio  for 
cigarettes,  which  left  Mr.  Harbison  to  me.  I  was  in 
the  den,  sitting  in  a  low  chair  by  the  wood  fire  when 
he  came  in.  He  hesitated  in  the  doorway. 

"Would  you  prefer  being  alone,  or  may  I  come 
in?"  he  asked.  "Don't  mind  being  frank.  I  know 
you  are  tired." 

"I  have  a  headache,  and  I  am  sulking,"  I  said  un 
pleasantly,  "but  at  least  I  am  not  actively  venomous. 
Come  in." 

So  he  came  in  and  sat  down  across  the  hearth 
from  me,  and  neither  of  us  said  anything.  The  fire 
light  flickered  over  the  room,  bringing  out  the  faded 
hues  of  the  old  Japanese  prints  on  the  walls,  gleam 
ing  in  the  mother-of-pearl  eyes  of  the  dragon  on  the 
screen,  setting  a  grotesque  god  on  a  cabinet  to  nod 
ding.  And  it  threw  into  relief  the  strong  profile  of 
the  man  across  from  me,  as  he  stared  at  the  fire. 

57 


WHEN  A   MAN  MARRIES 

"I  am  afraid  I  am  not  very  interesting,"  I  said  at 
last,  when  he  showed  no  sign  of  breaking  the 
silence.  "The — the  illness  of  the  butler  and — Miss 
Caruthers'  arrival,  have  been  upsetting/' 

He  suddenly  roused  with  a  start  from  a  brown 
reverie. 

"I  beg  your  pardon,"  he  said,  "I — oh,  of  course 
not !  I  was  wondering  if  I — if  you  were  offended  at 
what  I  said  earlier  in  the  evening;  the — Brushwood 
Boy,  you  know,  and  all  that." 

''Offended  ?"  I  repeated,  puzzled. 

"You  see,  I  have  been  living  out  of  the  world  so 
long,  and  never  seeing  any  women  but  Indian 
squaws" — so  there  were  no  Spanish  girls! — "that 
I'm  afraid  I  say  what  comes  into  my  mind  without 
circumlocution.  And  then — I  did  not  know  you 
were  married." 

"No,  oh,  no,"  I  said  hastily.  "But,  of  course,  the 
more  a  woman  is  married — I  mean,  you  can  not  say 
too  many  nice  things  to  married  women.  They — 
need  them,  you  know." 

I  had  floundered  miserably^  with  his  .eyes  on  me, 

58 


THE   DOOR   WAS   CLOSED 

and  I  half  expected  him  to  be  shocked,  or  to  say  that 
married  women  should  be  satisfied  with  the  nice 
things  their  husbands  say  to  them.  But  he  merely 
remarked  apropos  of  nothing,  or  following  a  line  of 
thought  he  had  not  voiced,  that  it  was  trite  but  true 
that  a  good  many  men  owed  their  success  in  life  to 
their  wives. 

"And  a  good  many  owe  their  wives  to  their  suc 
cess  in  life,"  I  retorted  cynically.  At  which  he 
stared  at  me  again. 

It  was  then  that  the  real  complexity  of  the  situa 
tion  began  to  develop.  Some  one  had  rung  the  bell 
and  been  admitted  to  the  library  and  a  maid  came 
to  the  door  of  the  den.  When  she  saw  us  she  stopped 
uncertainly.  Even  then  it  struck  me  that  she  looked 
odd,  and  she  was  not  in  uniform.  However,  I  was 
not  informed  at  that  time  about  bachelor  establish 
ments,  and  the  first  thing  she  said,  when  she  had 
asked  to  speak  to  me  in  the  hall,  knocked  her  and  her 
clothes  clear  out  of  my  head.  Evidently  she  knew 
me. 

"Miss  McNair,"  she  said  in  a  low  tone,  "there  is 
59 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

a  lady  in  the  drawing-room,  a  veiled  person,  and  she 
is  asking  for  Mr.  Wilson." 

"Can  you  not  find  him?''  I  asked.  "He  is  in  the 
house,  probably  in  the  studio." 

The  girl  hesitated. 

"Excuse  me,  miss,  but  Miss  Caruthers — " 

Then  I  saw  the  situation. 

"Never  mind,"  I  said.  "Close  the  door  into  the 
drawing-room,  and  I  will  tell  Mr.  Wilson." 

But  as  the  girl  turned  toward  the  doorway,  the 
person  in  question  appeared  in  it,  and  raised  her 
veil.  I  was  perfectly  paralyzed.  It  was  Bella! 
Bella  in  a  fur  coat  and  a  veil,  with  the  most  tragic 
eyes  I  ever  saw  and  entirely  white  except  for  a  dab 
of  rouge  in  the  middle  of  each  cheek.  We  stared  at 
each  other  without  speech.  The  maid  turned  and 
went  down  the  hall,  and  with  that  Bella  came  over 
to  me  and  clutched  me  by  the  arm. 

"Who  was  being  carried  out  into  that  ambu 
lance  ?"  she  demanded,  glaring  at  me  with  the  most 
awful  intensity. 

"I'm  sure  I  don't  know,  Bella,"  I  said,  wriggling 
60 


"THERE  ISN'T  A  SERVANT  IN  THE  HOUSE,"  SHE  SAID 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

away  from  her  fingers.    "What  in  the  world  are  you 
doing  here  ?    I  thought  you  were  in  Europe." 

"You  are  hiding  something  from  me!"  she  ac 
cused.  "It  is  Jim !  I  see  it  in  your  face." 

"Well,  it  isn't,"  I  snapped.  "It  seems  to  me,  re 
ally,  Bella,  that  you  and  Jim  ought  to  be  able  to 
manage  your  own  affairs,  without  dragging  me  in." 
It  was  not  pleasant,  but  if  she  was  suffering,  so 
was  I.  "Jim  is  as  well  as  he  ever  was.  He's  up 
stairs  somewhere.  I'll  send  for  him." 

She  gripped  me  again,  and  held  on  while  her  color 
came  back. 

"You'll  do  nothing  of  the  kind,"  she  said,  and. she 
had  quite  got  hold  of  herself  again.  "I  do  not  want 
to  see  him  :  I  hope  you  don't  think,  Kit,  that  I  came 
here  to  see  James  Wilson.  Why,  I  have  forgotten 
that  there  is  such  a  person,  and  you  know  it." 

Somebody  up-stairs  laughed,  and  I  was  growing 
nervous.  What  if  Aunt  Selina  should  come  down, 
or  Mr.  Harbison  come  out  of  the  den  ? 

"Why  did  you  come,  then,  Bella?"  I  inquired. 
"He  may  come  in." 

62 


THE    DOOR    WAS    CLOSED 

"I  was  passing  in  the  motor,"  she  said,  and  I  hon 
estly  think  she  hoped  I  would  believe  her,  "and  I 
saw  that  am — "  She  stopped  and  began  again. 
"I  thought  Jim  was  out  of  town,  and  I  came  to  see 
Takahiro,"  she  said  brazenly.  "He  was  devoted  to 
me,  and  Evans  is  going  to  leave.  I'll  tell  you  what 
to  do,  Kit.  I'll  go  back  to  the  dining-room,  and 
you  send  Taka  there.  If  any  one  comes,  I  can  slip 
into  the  pantry." 

"It's  immoral,"  I  protested.  "It's  immoral  to  steal 
your—" 

"My  own  butler!"  she  broke  in  impatiently. 
"You're  not  usually  so  scrupulous,  Kit.  Hurry !  I 
hear  that  hateful  Anne  Brown." 

So  we  slid  back  along  the  hall,  and  I  rang  for 
Takahiro.  But  no  one  came. 

"I  think  I  ought  to  tell  you,  Bella,"  I  said  as  we 
waited,  and  Bella  was  staring  around  the  room — 
"I  think  you  ought  to  know  that  Miss  Caruthers  is 
here."  Bella  shrugged  her  shoulders. 

"Well,  thank  goodness,"  she  said,  "I  don't  have 
to  see  her.  The  only  pleasant  thing  I  remember 

63 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

about  my  year  of  married  life  is  that  I  did  not  meet 
Aunt  Selina.*' 

I  rang  again,  but  still  there  was  no  answer.  And 
then  it  occurred  to  me  that  the  stillness  below-stairs 
was  almost  oppressive.  Bella  was  noticing  things, 
too,  for  she  began  to  fasten  her  veil  again  with  a 
malicious  little  smile. 

"One  of  the  things  I  remember  my  late  husband 
saying,"  she  observed,  "was  that  he  could  manage 
this  house,  and  had  done  it  for  years,  with  flawless 
service.  Stand  on  the  bell,  Kit." 

I  did.  We  stood  there,  with  the  table,  just  as  it 
had  been  left,  between  us,  and  waited  for  a  response. 
Bella  was  growing  impatient.  She  raised  her  eye 
brows  (she  is  very  handsome,  Bella  is)  and  flung 
out  her  chin  as  if  she  had  begun  to  enjoy  the  horrible 
situation. 

I  thought  I  heard  a  rattle  of  silver  from  the  pan 
try  just  then,  and  I  hurried  to  the  door  in  a  rage. 
But  the  pantry  was  empty  of  servants  and  full  of 
dishes,  and  all  the  lights  were  out  but  one,  which 
was  burning  dimly.  I  could  have  sworn  that  I  saw 

64 


THE   DOOR   WAS    CLOSED 

one  of  the  servants  duck  into  the  stairway  to  the 
basement,  but  when  I  got  there  the  stairs  were 
empty,  and  something  was  burning  in  the  kitchen 
below. 

Bella  had  followed  me  and  was  peering  over  my 
shoulder  curiously. 

"There  isn't  a  servant  in  the  house,"  she  said  tri 
umphantly.  And  when  we  went  down  to  the  kitch 
en,  she  seemed  to  be  right.  It  was  in  disgraceful 
order,  and  one  of  the  bottles  of  wine  that  had  been 
banished  from  the  dining-room  sat  half  empty  on 
the  floor. 

"Drunk!"  Bella  said  with  conviction.  But  I 
didn't  think  so.  There  had  not  been  time  enough, 
for  one  thing.  Suddenly  I  remembered  the  ambu 
lance  that  had  been  the  cause  of  Bella's  appearance 
— for  no  one  could  believe  her  silly  story  about 
Takahiro.  I  didn't  wait  to  voice  my  suspicion  to 
her ;  I  simply  left  her  there,  staring  helplessly  at  the 
confusion,  and  ran  up-stairs  again :  through  the  din 
ing-room,  past  Jimmy  and  Aunt  Selina,  past  Leila 
Mercer  and  Max,  who  were  flirting  on  the  stairs, 

65 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

up,  up  to  the  servants'  bedrooms,  and  there  my  sus 
picions  were  verified.  There  was  every  evidence  of 
a  hasty  flight;  in  three  bedrooms  five  trunks  stood 
locked  and  ominous,  and  the  closets  yawned  with 
open  doors,  empty.  Bella  had  been  right ;  there  was 
not  a  servant  in  the  house. 

As  I  emerged  from  the  untidy  emptiness  of  the 
servants'  wing,  I  met  Mr.  Harbison  coming  out  of 
the  studio. 

"I  wish  you  would  let  me  do  some  of  this  running 
about  for  you,  Mrs.  Wilson,"  he  said  gravely.  "You 
are  not  well,  and  I  can't  think  of  anything  worse  for 
a  headache.  Has  the  butler's  illness  clogged  the 
household  machinery?" 

,  "Worse,"  I  replied,  trying  not  to  breathe  in 
gasps.  "I  wouldn't  be  running  around — like  this — 
but  there  is  not  a  servant  in  the  house !  They  have 
gone,  the  entire  lot." 

"That's  odd,"  he  said  slowly.  "Gone!  Are  you 
sure?" 

In  reply  I  pointed  to  the  servants'  wing.  "Trunks 
packed,"  I  said  tragically,  "rooms  empty,  kitchen 

66 


THROWING  ON  THEIR  WRAPS  IN  A  HURRY 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

and  pantries  full  of  dishes.  Did  you  ever  hear  of 
anything  like  it?" 

"Never,"  he  asserted.  "It  makes  me  suspect — " 
What  he  suspected  he  did  not  say ;  instead  he  turned 
on  his  heel,  without  a  word  of  explanation,  and  ran 
down  the  stairs.  I  stood  staring  after  him,  wonder 
ing  if  every  one  in  the  place  had  gone  crazy.  Then 
I  heard  Betty  Mercer  scream  and  the  rest  talking 
loud  and  laughing,  and  Mr.  Harbison  came  up  the 
stairs  again  two  at  a  time. 

"How  long  has  that  Jap  been  ailing,  Mrs.  Wil 
son  ?"  he  asked. 

"I—I  don't  know,"  I  replied  helplessly.  "What 
is  the  trouble,  anyhow  ?" 

"I  think  he  probably  has  something  contagious," 
he  said,  "and  it  has  scared  the  servants  away.  As 
Mr.  Brown  said,  he  looked  spotty.  I  suggested  to 
your  husband  that  it  might  be  as  well  to  get  the 
house  emptied — in  case  we  are  correct." 

"Oh,  yes,  by  all  means,"  I  said  eagerly.  I  couldn't 
get  away  too  soon.  "I'll  go  and  get  my — "  Then 
I  stopped.  Why,  the  man  wouldn't  expect  me  to 

68 


THE    DOOR    WAS    CLOSED 

leave;  I  would  have  to  play  out  the  wretched  farce 
to  the  end! 

"I'll  go  down  and  see  them  off,"  I  finished  lamely, 
and  we  went  together  down  the  stairs. 

Just  for  the  moment  I  forgot  Bella  altogether.  I 
found  Aunt  Selina  bonneted  and  cloaked,  taking  a 
stirrup  cup  of  Pomona  for  her  nerves,  and  the  rest 
throwing  on  their  wraps  in  a  hurry.  Down-stairs 
Max  was  telephoning  for  his  car,  which  wasn't  due 
for  an  hour,  and  Jim  was  walking  up  and  down, 
swearing  under  his  breath.  With  the  prospect  of 
getting  rid  of  them  all,  and  of  going  home  comfort 
ably  to  try  to  forget  the  whole  wretched  affair,  I 
cheered  up  quite  a  lot.  I  even  played  up  my  part  of 
hostess,  and  Dallas  told  me,  aside,  that  I  was  a  brick. 

Just  then  Jim  threw  open  the  front  door. 

There  was  a  man  on  the  top  step,  with  his  mouth 
full  of  tacks,  and  he  was  nailing  something  to  the 
door,  just  below  Jim's  Florentine  bronze  knocker, 
and  standing  back  with  his  head  on  one  side  to  see 
if  it  was  straight. 

"What  are  you  doing?"  Jim  demanded  fiercely, 
69 


A   MAN   NAILING  SOMETHING  TO  THE  DOOR 


THE    DOOR    WAS    CLOSED 

but  the  man  only  drove  another  tack.  It  was  Mr. 
Harbison  who  stepped  outside  and  read  the  card. 

It  said  "Smallpox." 

"Smallpox,"  Mr.  Harbison  read,  as  if  he  couldn't 
believe  it.  Then  he  turned  to  us,  huddled  in  the  hall. 

"It  seems  it  wasn't  measles,  after  all,"  he  said 
cheerfully.  "I  move  we  get  into  Mr.  Reed's  auto 
mobile  out  there,  and  have  a  vaccination  party.  I 
suppose  even  you  blase  society  folk  have  not  ex 
hausted  that  kind  of  diversion." 

But  the  man  on  the  step  spat  his  tacks  in  his  hand 
and  spoke  for  the  first  time. 

"No,  you  don't,"  he  said.  "Not  on  your  life. 
Just  step  back,  please,  and  close  the  door.  This 
house  is  quarantined." 


CHAPTER   V 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

THERE  is  hardly  any  use  trying  to  de 
scribe  what  followed.  Anne  Brown 
began  to  cry,  and  talk  about  the 
children.  (She  went  to  Europe 
once  and  stayed  until  they  all  got 
over  the  whooping-cough.)  And  Dallas 
said  he  had  a  pull,  because  his  mill  con 
trolled  I  forget  how  many  votes,  and  the 
thing  to  do  was  to  be  quiet  and  comfortable  and  we 
would  get  out  in  the  morning.  Max  took  it  as  a  huge 
joke,  and  somebody  found  him  at  the  telephone, 
calling  up  his  club.  The  Mercer  girls  were  hyster 
ically  giggling,  and  Aunt  Selina  sat  on  a  stiff-backed 
chair  and  took  aromatic  spirits  of  ammonia.  As  for 
Jim,  he  had  collapsed  on  the  lowest  step  of  the  stairs, 
and  sat  there  with  his  head  in  his  hands.  When  he 
did  look  up,  he  didn't  dare  to  look  at  me. 

72 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

The  Harbison  man  was  arguing  with  the  impas 
sive  individual  on  the  top  step  outside,  and  I  saw 
him  get  out  his  pocketbook  and  offer  a  crisp  bundle 
of  bills.  But  the  man  from  the  board  of  health 
only  smiled  and  tacked  at  his  offensive  sign.  After 
a  while  Mr.  Harbison  came  in  and  closed  the  door, 
and  we  stared  at  one  another. 

"I  know  what  I'm  going  to  do,"  I  said,  swallow 
ing  a  lump  in  my  throat,  "I'm  going  to  get  out 
through  a  basement  window  at  the  back.  I'm  going 
home." 

"Home!"  Aunt  Selina  gasped,  jumping  up  and 
almost  dropping  her  ammonia  bottle.  "My  dear 
Bella!  Home?" 

Jimmy  groaned  at  the  foot  of  the  stairs,  but  Anne 
Brown  was  getting  over  her  tears  and  now  she 
turned  on  me  in  a  temper. 

"It's  all  your  fault,"  she  said.  "I  was  going  to 
stay  at  home  and  get  a  little  sleep — " 

"Well,  you  can  sleep  now,"  Dallas  broke  in. 
"There'll  be  nothing  to  do  but  sleep." 

"I  think  you  haven't  grasped  the  situation,  Dal," 

73 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

I  said  icily.  "There  will  be  plenty  to  do.  There 
isn't  a  servant  in  the  house !" 

"No  servants!"  everybody  cried  at  once.  The 
Mercer  girls  stopped  giggling. 

"Holy  cats!"  Max  stopped  in  the  act  of  hanging 
up  his  overcoat.  "Do  you  mean — why,  I  can't  shave 
myself!  I'll  cut  my  head  off." 

"You'll  do  more  than  that/'  I  retorted  grimly. 
"You  will  carry  coal  and  tend  fires  and  empty  ash 
pans,  and  when  you  are  not  doing  any  of  those 
things  there  will  be  pots  and  pans  to  wash  and  beds 
to  make." 

Then  there  was  a  row.  We  had  worked  back  to 
the  den  now,  and  I  stood  in  front  of  the  fireplace  and 
let  the  storm  beat  around  me,  and  tried  to  look  per 
fectly  cold  and  indifferent,  and  not  to  see  Mr.  Harbi 
son's  shocked  face.  No  wonder  he  thought  them  a 
lot  of  savages,  browbeating  their  hostess  the  way 
they  did. 

"It's  a  fool  thing  anyhow,"  Max  Reed  wound 
up,  "to  celebrate  the  anniversary  of  a  divorce — espe 
cially — "  Here  he  caught  Jim's  eye  and  stopped. 

74 


\ 


SOMEBODY  FOUND  HIM  CALLING  UP  HIS  CLUB 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

But  I  had  suddenly  remembered.  Bella  down  in  the 
basement! 

Could  anything  have  been  worse  ?  And  of  course 
she  would  have  hysteria  and  then  turn  on  me  and 
blame  me  for  it  all.  It  all  came  over  me  at  once  and 
overwhelmed  me,  while  Anne  was  crying  and  saying 
she  wouldn't  cook  if  she  starved  for  it,  and  Aunt  Se- 
lina  was  taking  off  her  wraps.  I  felt  queer  all  over, 
and  I  sat  down  suddenly.  Mr.  Harbison  was  look 
ing  at  me,  and  he  brought  me  a  glass  of  wine. 

"It  won't  be  so  bad  as  you  fear,"  he  said  comfort 
ingly.  "There  will  be  no  danger  once  we  are  vac 
cinated,  and  many  hands  make  light  work.  They  are 
pretty  raw  now,  because  the  thing  is  new  to  them, 
but  by  morning  they  will  be  reconciled." 

"It  isn't  the  work :  it  is  something  entirely  differ 
ent,"  I  said.  And  it  was.  Bella  and  work  could 
hardly  be  spoken  in  the  same  breath. 

If  I  had  only  turned  her  out  as  she  deserved  to  be, 
when  she  first  came,  instead  of  allowing  her  to  carry 
through  the  wretched  farce  about  seeing  Takahiro! 
Or  if  I  had  only  run  to  the  basement  the  moment 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

the  house  was  quarantined,  and  got  her  out  the  area- 
way  or  the  coal-hole !  And  now  time  was  flying,  and 
Aunt  Selina  had  me  by  the  arm,  and  any  moment  I 
expected  Bella  to  pounce  on  us  through  the  doorway 
and  the  whole  situation  to  explode  with  a  bang. 

It  was  after  eleven  before  they  were  rational 
enough  to  discuss  ways  and  means,  and,  of  course, 
the  first  thing  suggested  was  that  we  all  adjourn 
below-stairs  and  clean  up  after  dinner.  I  could  have 
slain  Max  Reed  for  the  notion,  and  the  Mercer  girls 
for  taking  him  up. 

"Of  course  we  will,"  they  said  in  a  duet.  "What 
a  lark!"  And  they  actually  began  to  pin  up  their 
dinner  gowns.  It  was  Jim  who  stopped  that. 

"Oh,  look  here,  you  people,"  he  objected,  "I'm 
not  going  to  let  you  do  that.  We'll  get  some  serv 
ants  in  to-morrow.  I'll  go  down  and  put  out  the 
lights.  There  will  be  enough  clean  dishes  for  break 
fast." 

It  was  lucky  for  me  that  they  started  a  new  dis 
cussion  then  and  there  about  who  would  get  the 
breakfast.  In  the  midst  of  the  excitement  I  slipped 

77 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

away  to  carry  the  news  to  Bella.  She  was  where 
I  had  left  her,  and  she  had  made  herself  a  cup  of  tea, 
and  was  very  much  at  home,  which  was  natural. 

"Do  you  know,"  she  said  ominously,  "that  you 
have  been  away  for  two  hours;  and  that  I  have 
gone  through  agonies  of  nervousness  for  fear  Jim 
Wilson  would  come  down  and  think  I  came  here  to 
see  him?" 

"No  one  would  think  that,  Bella/'  I  soothed  her. 
"Everybody  knows  you  loathe  him — Jim,  too."  She 
looked  at  me  over  the  edge  of  her  cup. 

"I'll  run  along  now,"  she  said,  "since  Takahiro 
isn't  here.  And  if  Jim  has  any  sense  at  all,  he  will 
clear  out  every  maid  in  the  house.  I  never  saw  such 
a  kitchen  in  all  my  life.  Well,  lead  the  way,  Kit.  I 
suppose  they  are  deep  in  bridge,  or  roulette,  or 
something." 

She  was  fixing  her  veil,  and  I  saw  I  would  have 
to  tell  her.  Personally,  I  would  much  rather  have 
told  her  the  house  was  on  fire. 

"Wait  a  minute,  Bella,"  I  said.  "You  see,  some 
thing  queer  has  happened.  You  know  this  is  the  an- 

78 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

niversary — well,  you  know  what  it  is — and  Jim  was 
awfully  glum.  So  we  thought  we  would  come — " 

"What  are  you  driving  at?"  she  demanded.  "You 
are  sea-green,  Kit.  What's  the  matter?  You 
needn't  think  I  mind  because  Jim  has  a  jollification 
to  celebrate  his  divorce." 

"It — it  was  Takahiro — in  the  ambulance,"  I  blurt 
ed.  "Smallpox.  We — Bella,  we  are  shut  in,  quar 
antined." 

She  didn't  faint.  She  just  sat  down  and  stared  at 
me,  and  I  stared  back  at  her.  Then  a  miserable 
alarm  clock  on  the  table  suddenly  went  off  like  an 
explosion,  and  Bella  began  to  laugh.  I  knew  what 
that  was — hysteria.  She  always  had  attacks  like 
that  when  things  went  wrong.  I  was  quite  despair 
ing  by  that  time;  I  hoped  they  would  all  hear  her 
and  come  down-stairs  and  take  her  up  and  put  her  to 
bed  like  a  Christian,  so  she  could  giggle  her  soul  out. 
But  after  a  bit  she  quieted  down  and  began  to  cry 
softly,  and  I  knew  the  worst  was  over.  I  gave  her 
a  shake,  and  she  was  so  angry  that  she  got  over  it 
altogether. 

79 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Kit,  you  are  horrid,"  she  choked.  "Don't  you  see 
what  a  position  I  am  in?  I  am  not  going  up-stairs 
to  face  Anne  and  the  rest  of  them.  You  can  just 
put  me  in  the  coal  cellar." 

"Isn't  there  a  window  you  could  get  through?"  I 
asked  desperately.  "Locking  the  door  doesn't  shut 
up  a  whole  house." 

Bella's  courage  revived  at  that,  and  she  said  yes, 
there  were  windows,  plenty  of  them,  only  she  didn't 
see  how  she  could  get  out.  And  I  said  she  would 
have  to  get  out,  because  I  was  playing  Bella  in  the 
performance,  and  I  didn't  care  to  have  an  under 
study.  Then  the  situation  dawned  on  her,  and  she 
sat  down  and  laughed  herself  weak  in  the  knees. 
Of  course  she  wanted  to  stay,  then,  and  see  the  fun 
out.  But  I  was  firm ;  she  would  have  to  go,  and  I 
told  her  so.  Things  were  complicated  enough  with 
out  her. 

Well,  we  looked  funny,  no  doubt.  Bella  in  a  Rus 
sian  pony  automobile  coat  over  the  black  satin  she 
had  worn  at  the  Clevelands'  dinner,  and  I  in  cream 
lace,  the  skirt  gathered  up  from  the  kitchen  floor, 

80 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

with  Bella's  ermine  pelerine  around  my  bare  shoul 
ders,  and  dishes  and  overturned  chairs  everywhere. 

Bella  knew  more  about  the  lower  regions  of  her 
ex-home  than  I  would  have  thought.  She  opened  a 
door  in  a  corner  and  led  the  way  through  a  narrow 
hall  past  the  refrigerating-room,  to  a  huge,  cement 
ed  cellar,  with  a  furnace  in  the  center,  and  a  half- 
dozen  electric  lights  making  it  really  brilliant. 

"Get  a  chair,"  Bella  said  over  her  shoulder,  ex 
citedly.  "I  can  get  out  easily  here,  through  the  coal 
hole.  Imagine  my — " 

But  it  was  my  turn  to  grip  Bella.  From  behind 
the  furnace  were  coming  the  most  terrible  sounds, 
rasping  noises  that  fairly  frayed  the  silk  of  my 
nerves.  We  stood  petrified  for  an  instant.  Then 
Bella  laughed.  "They  are  not  all  gone,"  she  said 
carefully.  "Some  one  is  asleep  there." 

We  tiptoed  to  where  we  could  see  around  the  fur 
nace,  and,  sure  enough,  some  one  was  asleep  there. 
Only,  it  was  not  one  of  the  servants ;  it  was  a  portly 
policeman,  with  a  newspaper  and  an  empty  plate  on 
the  floor  on  one  side,  and  a  champagne  bottle  on  the 

81 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

other.  He  had  slid  down  in  his  chair,  with  his  chin 
on  his  brass  buttons,  and  his  helmet  had  rolled  a 
dozen  feet  away.  Bella  had  to  clap  her  hand  over 
her  mouth. 

"Fairly  caught!"'  she  whispered.  "Sartor  Re- 
sartus,  the  arrester  arrested.  Oh,  Jim  and  his  flaw 
less  service !" 

But  after  we  got  over  our  surprise,  we  saw  the 
situation  was  serious.  The  policeman  was  threaten 
ing  to  awaken.  Once  he  stopped  snoring  to  yawn 
noisily,  and  we  beat  a  hasty  retreat.  Bella  switched 
off  the  lights  in  a  hurry  and  locked  the  door  behind 
us.  We  hardly  breathed  until  we  were  back  in  the 
kitchen  again,  and  everything  quiet.  And  then 
Jimmy  called  my  name  from  up  above  somewhere. 

"I  am  going  to  call  him  down,  Bella,"  I  said 
firmly.  "Let  him  help  you  out.  I'm  sure  I  don't 
see  why  I  should  have  all  this  when  the  two  of 
you—" 

"Oh,  no,  no!  Surely,  Kit,  you  wouldn't  be  so 
cruel !"  she  whispered  pleadingly.  "You  know  what 
he  would  think.  He — oh,  Kit,  let  them  all  get  set- 

82 


'I 


WL  STOOD  PETRIFIED  FOR  AN  INSTANT 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

tied  for  the  night,  and  then  come  down,  like  a  dear, 
and  help  me  out.  I  know  loads  of  ways — honestly 
I  do." 

"If  I  leave  you  here,"  I  debated,  "what  about  the 
policeman?" 

"Never  mind  him"— frantically.  "Listen !  There's 
Jim  up  in  the  pantry.  Run,  for  the  sake  of  Heaven !" 

So — I  ran.  At  the  top  of  the  stairs  I  met  Jimmy, 
very  crumpled  as  to  shirt-front  and  dejected  as  to 
face. 

"I've  been  hunting  everywhere  for  you,"  he  said 
dismally.  "I  thought  you  had  added  to  the  general 
merriment  by  falling  down-stairs  and  breaking  your 
neck." 

I  went  past  him  with  my  chin  up.  Now  that  I 
had  time  to  think  about  it,  I  was  furiously  angry 
with  him. 

"Kit r  he  called  after  me  appealingly,  but  I  would 
not  hear.  Then  he  adopted  different  tactics.  He 
took  advantage  of  my  catching  my  foot  in  the  lace 
of  my  gown  to  pass  me,  and  to  stand  with  his  back 
against  the  door. 


FROM    THE   TREE   OF   LOVE 

"You're  not  going  until  you  hear  me,  Kit,"  he  de 
clared  miserably.  "In  the  first  place,  for  all  you  are 
down  on  me,  is  it  my  fault?  Honestly,  now,  is  it 
my  fault?" 

I  refused  to  speak. 

"I  was  coming  home  to  be  miserable  alone/'  he 
went  on,  "and — oh,  I  know  you  meant  well,  Kit; 
but  you  asked  all  these  crazy  people  here." 

"Perhaps  you  will  give  me  credit  for  some 
things,"  I  said  wearily.  "I  did  not  give  Takahiro 
smallpox,  for  instance,  and — if  you  will  permit  me 
to  mention  the  fact — Aunt  Selina  is  not  my  Aunt 
Selina." 

"That's  what  I  wanted  to  speak  to  you  about," 
Jimmy  went  on  wretchedly,  trying  not  to  look  at 
me.  "You  see,  when  they  were  rowing  so  about 
who  would  get  the  breakfast — I  never  saw  such  a 
lot  of  people;  half  of  them  never  touch  breakfast, 
but  of  course  now  they  want  all  kinds  of  things — 
when  they  were  talking,  Aunt  Selina  said  she  knew 
you  would  get  it,  being  the  hostess,  and  responsible, 
besides  knowing  where  things  are  kept."  He  had 

85 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

fixed  his  eyes  on  the  orchids,  and  he  looked 
shrunken,  actually  shrunken.  "I  thought,"  he  fin 
ished,  "you  might  give  me  a  few  pointers  now,  and 
I  could  come  down  in  the  morning,  and — and  fuss 
up  something,  coffee  and  so  on.  I  would  say  you 
did  it!  Oh,  hang  it  all,  Kit,  why  don't  you  say 
something?" 

"What  do  you  want  me  to  say?"  I  demanded. 
"That  I  love  to  cook,  and  of  course  I'll  fix  trays  and 
carry  them  up  in  the  morning  to  Anne  Brown  and 
Leila  Mercer  and  the  rest;  and  that  I  will  have  the 
shaving  water  ready — " 

"I  know  what  I'm  going  to  do,"  Jimmy  said,  with 
a  sudden  resolution.  "Aunt  Selina  and  her  money 
can  go  to  blazes.  I  am  going  right  up-stairs  and 
tell  her  the  truth,  tell  her  who  you  are,  what  I  am, 
and  all  the  rest  of  it."  He  opened  the  door. 

"You'll  do  nothing  of  the  kind,"  I  gasped,  catch 
ing  him  in  time.  "Don't  you  dare,  Jimmy  Wilson ! 
Why,  what  would  they  think  of  me  ?  After  letting 
her  call  me  Bella,  and  him — Jim,  if  Mr.  Harbison 
ever  learns  the  truth — I — I  will  take  poison.  If  we 

86 


FROM    THE   TREE    OF   LOVE 

are  going  to  be  shut  up  here  together,  we  will  have 
to  carry  it  on.  I  couldn't  stand  the  disgrace." 

In  spite  of  an  heroic  effort,  Jim  looked  relieved. 
"They  have  been  hunting  for  the  linen  closet,"  he 
said,  more  cheerfully,  "and  there  will  be  room 
enough,  I  think.  Harbison  and  I  will  hang  out  in 
the  studio ;  there  are  two  couches  there.  I'm  afraid 
you'll  have  to  take  Aunt  Selina,  Kit." 

"Certainly,"  I  said  coldly.  That  was  the  way  it 
was  all  along.  Whenever  there  was  something  to 
do  that  no  one  else  would  undertake — any  unpleas 
ant  responsibility — that  entire  mongrel  household 
turned  with  one  gesture  and  pointed  its  finger  at  me ! 
Well,  it  is  over  now,  and  I  ought  not  to  be  bitter, 
considering  everything. 

It  was  quite  characteristic  of  that  memorable 
evening  (that  is  quite  novelesque,  I  think)  that  my 
interview  with  Jimmy  should  have  a  sensational  end 
ing.  He  was  terribly  down,  of  course,  and  as  I  was 
trying  to  pass  him  to  get  to  the  door,  he  caught  my 
hand. 

"You're  a  girl  in  a  thousand,  Kit/'  he  said  for- 

87 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

lornly.  "If  I  were  not  so  damnably,  hopelessly, 
idiotically  in  love  with — somebody  else,  I  should  be 
crazy  about  you." 

"Don't  be  maudlin,"  I  retorted.  "Would  you 
mind  letting  my  hand  go  ?"  I  felt  sure  Bella  could 
hear. 

"Oh,  come  now,  Kit,"  he  implored,  "we've  al 
ways  got  along  so  well.  It's  a  shame  to  let  a  thing 
like  this  make  us  bad  friends.  Aren't  you  ever  go 
ing  to  forgive  me?" 

"Never,"  I  said  promptly.  "When  I  once  get 
away,  I  don't  want  ever  to  see  you  again.  I  was 
never  so  humiliated  in  my  life.  I  loathe  you !" 

Then  I  turned  around,  and,  of  course,  there  was 
Aunt  Selina  with  her  eyes  protruding  until  you 
could  have  knocked  them  off  with  a  stick,  and  be 
side  her,  very  red  and  uncomfortable,  Mr.  Harbi 
son! 

"Bella!"  she  said  in  a  shocked  voice,  "is  that  the 
way  you  speak  to  your  husband !  It  is  high  time  I 
came  here,  I  think,  and  took  a  hand  in  this  affair." 

"Oh,  never  mind,  Aunt  Selina,"  Jim  said,  with 
88 


WITH  HIS  CHIN  ON  HIS  BRASS  BUTTONS 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

a  sheepish  grin.  "Kit — Bella  is  tired  and  nervous. 
This  is  a  h — deuce  of  a  situation.  No — er — serv 
ants,  and  all  that." 

But  Aunt  Selina  did  mind,  and  showed  it.  She 
pulled  the  unlucky  Harbison  man  through  the  door 
and  closed  it,  and  then  stood  glaring  at  both  of  us. 

"Every  little  quarrel  is  an  apple  knocked  from  the 
tree  of  love/'  she  announced  oratorically. 

"This  was  a  very  little  quarrel,"  Jim  said,  edging 
toward  the  door;  "a — a  green  apple,  Aunt  Selina, 
a  colicky  little  green  apple."  But  she  was  not  to 
be  diverted. 

"Bella,"  she  said  severely,  "you  said  you  loathed 
him.  You  didn't  mean  that." 

"But  I  do!"  I  cried  hysterically.  "There  isn't  any 
word  to  tell  how  I — how  I  detest  him." 

Then  I  swept  past  them  all  and  flew  to  Bella's 
dressing-room  and  locked  myself  in.  Aunt  Selina 
knocked  until  she  was  tired,  then  gave  up  and  went 
to  bed. 

That  was  the  night  Anne  Brown's  pearl  collar  was 
stolen ! 

90 


CHAPTER  VI 

A    MIGHTY    POOR   JOKE 

OF  course,  one  knows  that 
there  are  people  who  in  a  dif 
ferent  grade  of  society 
would  be  shoplifters  and 
pickpockets.  When  they 
are  restrained  by  obligation 
or  environment  they  become 
a  little  overkeen  at  bridge,  or 
take  the  wrong  sables,  or  stuff 
a  gold-backed  brush  into  a  muff  at  a  reception.  You 
remember  the  ivory  dressing  set  that  Theodora 
Bucknell  had,  fastened  with  fine  gold  chains?  And 
the  sensation  it  caused  at  the  Bucknell  cotillion  when 
Mrs.  Van  Zire  went  sweeping  to  her  carriage  with 
two  feet  of  gold  chain  hanging  from  the  front  of 
her  wrap? 

91 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

But  Anne's  pearl  collar  was  different.  In  the 
first  place,  instead  of  three  or  four  hundred  people, 
the  suspicion  had  to  be  divided  among  ten.  And 
of  those  ten,  at  least  eight  of  us  were  friends,  and 
the  other  two  had  been  vouched  for  by  the  Browns 
and  Jimmy.  It  was  a  horrible  mix-up.  For  the 
necklace  was  gone — there  couldn't  be  any  doubt  of 
that — and  although,  as  Dallas  said,  it  couldn't  get 
out  of  the  house,  still,  there  were  plenty  of  places 
to  hide  the  thing. 

•  The  worst  of  our  trouble  really  originated  with 
Max  Reed,  after  all.  For  it  was  Max  who  made 
the  silly  wager  over  the  telephone,  with  Dick  Bag- 
ley.  He  bet  five  hundred  even  that  one  of  us,  at 
least,  would  break  quarantine  within  the  next  twen 
ty-four  hours,  and,  of  course,  that  settled  it.  Dick 
told  it  around  the  club  as  a  joke,  and  a  man  who 
owns  a  newspaper  heard  him  and  called  up  the  pa 
per.  Then  the  paper  called  up  the  health  office, 
after  setting  up  a  flaming  scare-head,  "Will  Money 
Free  Them?  Board  of  Health  versus  Million- 


92 


A    MIGHTY    POOR   JOKE 

It  was  almost  three  when  the  house  settled  down 
— nobody  had  any  night-clothes,  although  finally, 
through  Dallas,  who  gave  them  to  Anne,  who  gave 
them  to  the  rest,  we  got  some  things  of  Jimmy's — • 
and  I  was  still  dressed.  The  house  was  perfectly 
quiet,  and,  after  listening  carefully,  I  went  slowly 
down  the  stairs.  There  was  a  light  in  the  hall,  and 
another  back  in  the  dining-room,  and  I  got  along 
without  any  trouble.  But  the  pantry,  where  the 
stairs  led  down,  was  dark,  and  the  wretched  swing 
ing  door  would  not  stay  open. 

I  caught  my  skirt  in  the  door  as  I  went  through, 
and  I  had  to  stop  to  loosen  it.  And  in  that  awful 
minute  I  heard  some  one  breathing  just  beside  me. 
I  had  stooped  to  my  gown,  and  I  turned  my  head 
without  straightening — I  couldn't  have  raised  my 
self  to  an  erect  posture,  for  my  knees  were  giving 
way  under  me — and  just  at  my  feet  lay  the  still 
glowing  end  of  a  match ! 

I  had  to  swallow  twice  before  I  could  speak. 
Then  I  said  sharply : 

"Who's  there?" 

93 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

The  man  was  so  close  it  is  a  wonder  I  had  not 
walked  into  him ;  his  voice  was  right  at  my  ear. 

"I  am  sorry  I  startled  you,"  he  said  quietly.  "I 
was  afraid  to  speak  suddenly,  or  move,  for  fear  I 

would  do — what  I  have  done/' 
> 

It  was  Mr.  Harbison. 

"I — I  thought  you  were — it  is  very  late,"  I  man 
aged  to  say,  with  dry  lips.  "Do  you  know  where 
the  electric  switch  is?'' 

"Mrs.  Wilson !"  It  was  clear  he  had  not  known 
me  before.  "Why,  no;  don't  you?" 

"I  am  all  confused,"  I  muttered,  and  beat  a  re 
treat  into  the  dining-room.  There,  in  the  friendly 
light,  we  could  at  least  see  each  other,  and  I  think 
he  was  as  much  impressed  by  the  fact  that  I  had  not 
undressed  as  I  was  by  the  fact  that  he  had,  partly. 
He  wore  a  hideous  dressing-gown  of  Jimmy's,  much 
too  small,  and  his  hair,  parted  and  plastered  down 
in  the  early  evening,  stood  up  in  a  sort  of  brown 
brush  all  over  his  head.  He  was  trying  to  flatten 
it  with  his  hands. 

"It  must  be  three  o'clock,"  he  said,  with  polite 
94 


A    MIGHTY    POOR   JOKE 

surprise,  "and  the  house  is  like  a  barn.  You  ought 
not  to  be  running  around  with  your  arms  uncov 
ered,  Mrs.  Wilson.  Surely  you  could  have  called 
some  of  us." 

"I  didn't  wish  to  disturb  any  one,"  I  said,  with 
distinct  truth. 

"I  suppose  you  are  like  me,"  he  said.  "The  nov 
elty  of  the  situation — and  everything.  I  got  to 
thinking  things  over,  and  then  I  realized  the  studio 
was  getting  cold,  so  I  thought  I  would  come  down 
and  take  a  look  at  the  furnace.  I  didn't  suppose  any 
one  else  would  think  of  it.  But  I  lost  myself  in  that 
pantry,  stumbled  against  a  half-open  drawer,  and 
nearly  went  down  the  dumb-waiter."  And,  as  if  in 
judgment  on  me,  at  that  instant  came  two  rather 
terrific  thumps  from  somewhere  below,  and  inar 
ticulate  words,  shouted  rather  than  spoken.  It  was 
uncanny,  of  course,  coming  as  it  did  through  the 
register  at  our  feet.  Mr.  Harbison  looked  startled. 

"Oh,  by  the  way,"  I  said,  as  carelessly  as  I  could. 
"In  the  excitement,  I  forgot  to  mention  it.  There 
is  a  policeman  asleep  in  the  furnace-room.  I — I 

95 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

suppose  we  will  have  to  keep  him  now,"  I  finished 
as  airily  as  possible. 

"Oh,  a  policeman — in  the  cellar,"  he  repeated, 
staring  at  me,  and  he  moved  toward  the  pantry 
door. 

"You  needn't  go  down,"  I  said  feverishly,  with 
visions  of  Bella  Knowles  sitting  on  the  kitchen 
table,  surrounded  by  soiled  dishes  and  all  the  cheer 
less  aftermath  of  a  dinner  party.  "Please  don't  go 
down.  I — it's  one  of  my  rules — never  to  let  a 
stranger  go  down  to  the  kitchen.  I — I'm  peculiar 
— that  way — and  besides,  it's — it's  mussy." 

Bang!  Crash!  th rough  the  register  pipe,  and 
some  language  quite  articulate.  Then  silence. 

"Look  here,  Mrs.  Wilson,"  he  said  resolutely. 
"What  do  I  care  about  the  kitchen?  I'm  going 
down  and  arrest  that  policeman  for  disturbing  the 
peace.  He  will  have  the  pipes  down." 

"You  must  not  go,"  I  said,  with  desperate  firm 
ness.  "He — he  is  probably  in  a  very  dangerous 
state  just  now.  We — I — locked  him  in." 

96 


"  YOU    WRETCH  !  "   SHE   SAID   UNGRATEFULLY,   AFTER  SHE 
HAD   YAWNED 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

The  Harbison  man  grinned  and  then  became  se 
rious.  4  . 

"Why  don't  you  tell  me  the  whole  thing?"  he 
demanded.  "You've  been  in  trouble  all  evening,  and 
— you  can  trust  me,  you  know,  because  I  am  a  stran 
ger;  because  the  minute  this  crazy  quarantine  is 
raised  I  am  off  to  the  Argentine  Republic,"  (perhaps 
he  said  Chili)  "and  because  I  don't  know  anything 
at  all  about  you.  You  see,  I  have  to  believe  what 
you  tell  me,  having  no  personal  knowledge  of  any 
of  you  to  go  on.  Now  tell  me — whom  have  you 
hidden  in  the  cellar,  besides  the  policeman?" 

There  was  no  use  trying  to  deceive  him :  he  was 
looking  straight  into  my  eyes.  So  I  decided  to  make 
the  best  of  a  bad  thing.  Anyhow,  it  was  going  to 
require  strength  to  get  Bella  through  the  coal-hole 
with  one  arm  and  restrain  the  policeman  with  the 
other. 

"Come,"  I  said,  making  a  sudden  resolution,  and 
led  the  way  down  the  stairs. 

He  said  nothing  when  he  saw  Bella,  for  which  I 
was  grateful.  She  was  sitting  at  the  table,  with  her 

98 


A    MIGHTY    POOR   JOKE 

arms  in  front  of  her,  and  her  head  buried  in  them. 
And  then  I  saw  she  was  asleep.  Her  hat  and  veil 
laid  beside  her,  and  she  had  taken  off  her  coat  and 
draped  it  around  her.  She  had  rummaged  out  a  cold 
pheasant  and  some  salad,  and  had  evidently  had  a 
little  supper.  Supper  and  a  nap,  while  I  worried 
myself  gray-headed  about  her ! 

"She — she  came  in  unexpectedly-— something 
about  the  butler,"  I  explained  under  my  breath. 
"And — she  doesn't  want  to  stay.  She  is  on  bad 
terms  with — :with  some  of  the  people  up-stairs.  You 
can  see  how  impossible  the  situation  is." 

"I  doubt  if  we  can  get  her  out,"  he  said,  as  if  the 
situation  were  quite  ordinary.  "However,  we  can 
try.  She  seems  very  comfortable.  It's  a  pity  to 
rouse  her." 

Here  the  prisoner  in  the  furnace  room  broke  out 
afresh.  It  sounded  as  though  he  had  taken  a  lump 
of  coal  and  was  attacking  the  lock.  Mr.  Harbison 
followed  the  noise,  and  I  could  hear  him  arguing, 
not  gently. 

"Another  sound,"  he  finished,  "and  you  won't 
99 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

get  out  of  here  at  all,  unless  you  crawl  up  the  fur 
nace  pipe !" 

When  he  came  back,  Bella  was  rousing.  She 
lifted  her  head  with  her  eyes  shut  and  then  opened 
them  one  at  a  time,  blinked,  and  sat  up.  She  didn't 
see  him  at  first. 

"You  wretch!"  she  said  ungratefully,  after  she 
had  yawned.  "Do  you  know  what  time  it  is?  And 
that — "  Then  she  saw  Mr.  Harbison  and  sat  star 
ing  at  him. 

"This  is  Mr.  Harbison,"  I  said  to  her  hastily. 
"He — he  came  with  Anne  and  Dal  and — he  is  shut 
in,  too." 

By  that  time  Bella  had  seen  how  handsome  he 
was,  and  she  took  a  hair-pin  out  of  her  mouth,  and 
arched  her  eyebrows,  which  was  always  Bella's  best 
pose. 

"I  am  Miss  Knowles,"  she  said  sweetly  (of  course, 
the  court  had  given  her  back  her  name),  "and  I 
stopped  in  to-night,  thinking  the  house  was  empty, 
to  see  about  a — a  butler.  Unfortunately,  the  house 
was  quarantined  just  at  that  time,  and — here  I  am. 

TOO 


A   MIGHTY    POOR   JO  ICE 

Surely  there  can  not  be  any  harm  in  helping  me  to 
get  out?"  (Pleading  tone.)  "I  have  not  been  ex 
posed  to  any  contagion,  and  in  the  exhausted  state 
of  my  health  the  confinement  would  be  positively 
dangerous." 

She  rolled  her  eyes  at  him,  and  I  could  see  she 
was  making  an  impression.  Of  course  she  was  free. 
She  had  a  perfect  right  to  marry  again,  but  I  will 
say  this:  Bella  is  a  lot  better  looking  by  electric 
light  than  she  is  the  next  morning. 

The  upshot  of  it  was  that  the  gentleman  who 
built  bridges  and  looked  down  on  society  from  a 
lofty,  lonely  pinnacle  agreed  to  help  one  of  the  most 
gleaming  members  of  the  aforesaid  society  to  out 
wit  the  law. 

It  took  about  fifteen  minutes  to  quiet  the  police 
man.  Nobody  ever  knew  what  Mr.  Harbison  did 
to  him,  but  for  twenty-four  hours  he  was  quite 
tractable.  He  changed  after  that,  but  that  comes 
later  in  the  story.  Anyhow,  the  Harbison  man  went 
up-stairs  and  came  down  with  a  Bagdad  curtain  and 
a  cushion  to  match,  and  took  them  into  the  furnace- 

101 


BELLA  WAS  ON  A  CHAIR  READY  TO  FOLLOW 


A    MIGHTY    POOR   JOKE 

room,  and  came  out  and  locked  the  door  behind 
him,  and  then  we  were  ready  for  Bella's  escape. 

But  there  were  four  special  officers  and  three  re 
porters  watching  the  house,  as  a  result  of  Max 
Reed's  idiocy.  Once,  after  trying  all  the  other 
windows  and  finding  them  guarded,  we  discovered 
a  little  bit  of  a  hole  in  an  out-of-the-way  corner  that 
looked  like  a  ventilator  and  was  covered  with  a 
heavy  wire  screen.  No  prisoners  ever  dug  their  way 
out  of  a  dungeon  with  more  energy  than  that  with 
which  we  attacked  that  screen,  hacking  at  it  with 
kitchen  knives,  whispering  like  conspirators,  being 
scratched  with  the  ragged  edges  of  the  wire,  frozen 
with  the  cold  air  one  minute  and  boiling  with  excite 
ment  the  next.  And  when  the  wire  was  cut,  and 
Bella  had  rolled  her  coat  up  and  thrust  it  through, 
and  was  standing  on  a  chair  ready  to  follow,  some 
thing  outside  that  had  looked  like  a  barrel  moved 
and  said,  "Oh,  I  wouldn't  do  that  if  I  were  you.  It 
would  be  certain  to  be  undignified,  and  probably  it 
would  be  unpleasant — later." 

We  coaxed  and  pleaded  and  tried  to  bribe,  and 

103 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

that  happened,  as  it  turned  out,  to  be  one  of  the  worst 
things  we  had  to  endure.  For  the  whole  conversa 
tion  came  out  the  next  afternoon  in  the  paper,  with 
the  most  awful  drawings,  and  the  reporter  said  it 
was  the  flashing  of  the  jewels  we  wore  that  first 
attracted  his  attention.  And  that  brings  me  back 
to  the  robbery. 

For  when  we  had  crept  back  to  the  kitchen,  and 
Bella  was  fumbling  for  her  handkerchief  to  cry  into 
and  the  Harbison  man  was  trying  to  apologize  for 
the  language  he  had  used  to  the  reporter,  and  I  was 
on  the  verge  of  a  nervous  chill — well,  it  was  then 
that  Bella  forgot  all  about  crying  and  jumped  and 
held  out  her  arm. 

"My  diamond  bracelet!"  she  screeched.  "Look, 
I've  lost  it." 

Well,  we  went  over  every  inch  of  that  basement, 
until  I  knew  every  crack  in  the  flooring,  every  spot 
on  the  cement.  And  Bella  was  nasty,  and  said  that 
she  had  never  seen  that  part  of  the  house  in  such 
condition,  and  that  if  I  had  acted  like  a  sane  person 
and  put  her  out,  when  she  had  no  business  there  at 

104 


WE  WENT  OVER  EVERY  INCH  OF  THAT  BASEMENT 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

all,  she  would  have  had  her  freedom  and  her  brace 
let,  and  that  if  we  were  playing  a  joke  on  her  (as  if 
we  felt  like  joking!)  we  would  please  give  her  the 
bracelet  and  let  her  go  and  die  in  a  corner ;  she  felt 
very  queer. 

At  half-past  four  o'clock  we  gave  up. 

"It's  gone,"  I  said.  "I  don't  believe  you  wore  it 
here.  No  one  could  have  taken  it.  There  wasn't 
a  soul  in  this  part  of  the  house,  except  the  policeman 
and  he's  locked  in." 

At  five  o'clock  we  put  her  to  sleep  in  the  den. 
She  was  in  a  fearful  temper,  and  I  was  glad  enough 
to  be  able  to  shut  the  door  on  her.  Tom  Harbison 
— that  was  his  name — helped  me  to  creep  up-stairs, 
and  wanted  to  get  me  a  glass  of  ale  to  make  me 
sleep.  But  I  said  it  would  be  of  no  use,  as  I  had  to 
get  up  and  get  the  breakfast.  The  last  thing  he 
said  was  that  the  policeman  seemed  above  the  aver 
age  in  intelligence,  and  perhaps  we  could  train  him 
to  do  plain  cooking  and  dish-washing. 

I  did  not  go  to  sleep  at  once.  I  lay  on  the  chintz- 
covered  divan  in  Bella's  dressing-room  and  stared 

106 


A   MIGHTY   POOR   JOKE 

at  the  picture  of  her  with  the  violets  underneath.  I 
couldn't  see  what  there  was  about  Bella  to  inspire 
such  undying  devotion,  but  I  had  to  admit  that  she 
had  looked  handsome  that  night,  and  that  the  Har 
bison  man  had  certainly  been  impressed. 

At  seven  o'clock  Jimmy  Wilson  pounded  at  my 
door,  and  I  could  have  choked  him  joyfully.  I 
dragged  myself  to  the  door  and  opened  it,  and  then 
I  heard  excited  voices.  Everybody  seemed  to  be  up 
but  Aunt  Selina,  and  they  were  all  talking  at  once. 

Anne  Brown  was  in  the  center  of  the  group,  wav 
ing  her  hands,  while  Dallas  was  trying  to  hook  the 
back  of  her  gown  with  one  hand  and  hold  a  blanket 
around  himself  with  the  other.  No  one  was  dressed 
except  Anne,  and  she  had  been  up  for  an  hour,  look 
ing  in  shoes  and  under  the  corners  of  rugs  and 
around  the  bed  clothing  for  her  jeweled  collar. 
When  she  saw  me  she  began  all  over  again. 

"I  had  it  on  when  I  went  into  my  room,"  she  de 
clared,  "and  I  put  it  on  the  dressing-table  when  I 
undressed.  I  meant  to  put  it  under  my  pillow,  but 
I  forgot.  And  I  didn't  sleep  well :  I  was  awake  half 

107 


\ 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

the  night.  Wasn't  I,  Dal  ?  Then,  when  the  clock 
down-stairs  in  the  hall  was  chiming  five,  something 
roused  me,  and  I  sat  up  in  bed.  It  was  still  dark, 
but  I  pinched  Dal  and  said  there  was  somebody  in 
the  room.  You  remember  that,  don't  you,  Dal?" 

"I  thought  you  had  nightmare,"  he  said  sheep 
ishly. 

"I  lay  still  for  ages,  it  seemed  to  me,  and  then — 
the  door  into  the  hall  closed.  I  heard  the  catch 
click.  I  turned  on  the  light  over  the  bed  then,  and 
the  room  was  empty.  I  thought  of  my  collar,  and 
although  it  seemed  ridiculous,  with  the  house  sealed 
as  it  is,  and  all  of  us  friends  for  years — well,  I  got 
up  and  looked,  and  it  was  gone  1" 

No  one  spoke  for  an  instant.  It  was  a  queer  situ 
ation,  for  the  collar  was  gone;  Anne's  red  eyes 
showed  it  was  true.  And  there  we  stood,  every  one 
of  us  a  miserable  picture  of  guilt,  and  tried  to  look 
innocent  and  debonair  and  unsuspicious.  Finally 
Jim  held  up  his  hand  and  signified  that  he  wanted  to 
say  something. 

"It's  like  this,"  he  said :  "until  this  thing  is  cleared 
108 


FOR  HEAVEN'S  SAKE,  LET'S  TRY  TO  BE  SANE  !  " 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

up,  for  Heaven's  sake,  let's  try  to  be  sane !  If  every 
fellow  thinks  the  other  fellow  did  it,  this  house  will 
be  a  nice  little  hell  to  live  in.  And  if  anybody" — 
here  he  glared  around — "if  anybody  has  got  funny 
and  is  hiding  those  jewels,  I  want  to  say  that  he'd 
better  speak  up  now.  Later,  it  won't  be  so  easy  for 
him.  It's  a  mighty  poor  joke." 
But  nobody  spoke. 


no 


CHAPTER  VII 


WE   MAKE   AN   OMELET 

IT  was  Betty  Mercer 
who  said  she  was  hungry, 
and  got  us  switched 
from  the  delicate  sub 
ject  of  which  was  the 
thief  to  the  quite  as 
pressing  subject  of 
which  was  to  be  cook.  Aunt 
Selina  had  slept  quietly 
through  the  whole  thing — we  learned  afterward 
that  she  customarily  slept  on  her  left  side,  which 
was  on  her  good  ear.  We  gathered  in  the  Dallas 
Browns'  room,  and  Jimmy  proposed  a  plan. 

"We  can  have  anything  sent  in  that  we  want,"  he 
suggested  speciously,  "and  if  Dal  doesn't  make  good 

in 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

with  the  city  fathers,  you  girls  can  get  some  clothes 
anyhow.  Then,  we  can  have  dinner  sent  from  one 
of  the  hotels." 

"Why  not  all  the  meals?"  Max  suggested.  "I 
hope  you're  not  going  to  be  small  about  things, 
Jimmy." 

"It  ought  to  be  easy,"  Jim  persisted,  ignoring  the 
remark,  "for  nine  reasonably  intelligent  people  to 
boil  eggs  and  make  coffee,  which  is  all  we  need  for 
breakfast,  with  some  fruit." 

"Nine  of  us!"  Dallas  said  wickedly,  looking  at 
Tom  Harbison,  who  was  out  of  earshot,  "Why  nine 
of  us?  I  thought  Kit  here,  otherwise  known  as 
Bella,  was  going  to  show  off  her  housewifely  skill." 

It  ended,  however,  with  Mr.  Harbison  writing 
out  a  lot  of  slips,  cook,  scullery-maid,  chamber 
maid,  parlor-maid,  furnace-man,  and  butler,  and  as 
that  left  two  people  over — we  didn't  count  Aunt 
Selina — he  added  another  furnace-man  and  a 
trained  nurse.  Betty  Mercer  drew  the  trained  nurse 
slip,  and,  of  course,  she  was  delighted.  It  seems 
funny  now  to  look  back  and  think  what  a  dreadful 

112 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

time  she  really  had,  for  Aunt  Selina  took  the  grippe, 
you  know,  that  very  day. 

It  was  fate  that  I  should  go  back  to  that  awful 
kitchen,  for  of  course  my  slip  said  "cook."  Mr.  Har 
bison  was  butler,  and  Max  and  Dal  got  the  furnace, 
although  neither  of  them  had  ever  been  nearer  to 
a  bucket  of  coal  than  the  coupons  on  mining  stock. 
Anne  got  the  bedrooms,  and  Leila  was  parlor-maid. 
It  was  Jimmy  who  got  the  scullery  work,  but  he 
was  quite  crushed  by  this  time,  and  did  not  protest 
at  all. 

Max  was  in  a  very  bad  temper :  I  suppose  he  had 
not  had  enough  sleep — no  one  had.  But  he  came 
over  while  the  lottery  was  going  on  and  stood  over 
me  and  demanded  unpleasantly,  in  a  whisper,  that  I 
stop  masquerading  as  another  man's  wife  and  gener 
ally  making  a  fool  of  myself — which  is  the  way  he 
put  it.  And  I  knew  in  my  heart  that  he  was  right, 
and  I  hated  him  for  it. 

"Why  don't  you  go  and  tell  him — them?"  I  asked 
nastily.  No  one  was  paying  any  attention  to  us. 
"Tell  them  that,  to  be  obliging,  I  have  nearly 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

drowned  in  a  sea  of  lies;  tell  them  that  I  am 
not  only  not  married,  but  that  I  never  intend  to 
marry;  tell  them  that  we  are  a  lot  of  idiots  with 
nothing  better  to  do  than  to  trifle  with  strangers 
within  our  gates,  people  who  build — I  mean,  people 
that  are  worth  two  to  our  one !  Run  and  tell  them." 

He  looked  at  me  for  a  minute,  then  he  turned  on 
his  heel  and  left  me.  It  looked  as  though  Max 
might  be  going  to  be  difficult. 

While  I  was  improvising  an  apron  out  of  a  towel, 
and  Anne  was  pinning  a  sheet  into  a  kimono,  so  she 
could  take  off  her  dinner  gown  and  still  be  proper, 
Dallas  harked  back  to  the  robbery. 

"Anne  put  the  collar  on  the  table  there,"  He  said. 
"There's  no  mistake  about  that.  I  watched  her  do  it, 
for  I  remember  thinking  it  was  the  sole  reminder  I 
had  that  Consolidated  Traction  ever  went  above 
thirty-nine." 

Max  was  looking  around  the  room,  examining 
the  window-locks  and  whistling  between  his  teeth. 
He  was  in  disgrace  with  every  one,  for  by  that 
time  it  was  light  enough  to  see  three  reporters  with 

114 


IT  ENDED  WITH   MR,   HARBISON  WRITING  OUT  A  LOT  OF  SLIPS 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

cameras  across  the  street  waiting  for  enough  sun 
to  snap  the  house,  and  everybody  knew  that  it  was 
Max  and  his  idiotic  wager  that  had  done  it.  He 
had  made  two  or  three  conciliatory  remarks,  but  no 
one  would  speak  to  him.  His  antics  were  so  queer, 
however,  that  we  were  all  watching  him,  and  when 
he  had  felt  over  the  rug  with  his  hands,  and  raised 
the  edges,  and  tried  to  lift  out  the  chair-seats,  and 
had  shaken  out  Dai's  shoes  (he  said  people  often  hid 
things  and  then  forgot  about  it),  he  made  a  propo 
sition. 

"If  you  will  take  that  infernal  furnace  from 
around  my  neck,  I'll  undertake  either  to  find  the 
jewels  or  to  show  up  the  thief,"  he  said  quietly.  And 
of  course,  with  all  the  people  in  the  house  under  sus 
picion,  every  one  had  to  hail  the  suggestion  with 
joy,  and  to  offer  his  assistance,  and  Jimmy  had  to 
take  Max's  share  of  the  furnace.  So  they  took  the 
scullery  slip  down-stairs  to  the  policeman,  and  gave 
Jim  Max's  share  of  the  furnace.  (Yes,  I  had  broken 
the  policeman  to  them  gently.  Of  course,  Anne  said 
at  once  that  he  was  the  thief,  but  they  found  him 

116 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

tucked  in  and  sound  asleep  with  his  back  against  the 
furnace. ) 

"In  the  first  place,"  Max  said,  standing  impor 
tantly  in  the  middle  of  the  room,  "we  retired  be 
tween  two  and  three — nearer  three.  So  the  theft 
occurred  between  three  and  five,  when  Anne  woke 
up.  Was  your  door  locked,  Dal?" 

"No.  The  door  into  the  hall  was,  but  the  door 
into  the  dressing-room  was  open,  and  we  found  the 
door  from  there  into  the  hall  open  this  morning." 

"From  three  until  five,"  Max  repeated.  "Was 
any  one  out  of  his  room  during  that  time  ?" 

"I  was,"  said  Tom  Harbison  promptly,  from  the 
foot  of  the  bed.  "I  was  prowling  all  around  some 
where  about  four,  searching" — he  glanced  at  me — 
"for  a  drink  of  water.  But  as  I  don't  know  a  pearl 
from  a  glass  bead,  I  hope  you  exonerate  me." 

Everybody  laughed  and  said,  "Of  course,"  and 
"Sure,  old  man,"  and  changed  the  subject  quickly. 
While  that  excitement  was  on,  I  got  Jim  to  one  side 
and  told  him  about  Bella.  His  good-natured  face 
was  radiant  at  first. 

117 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"I  suppose  she  did  come  to  see  Takahiro,  eh, 
Kit?''  he  asked  delicately.  "She  didn't  say  any 
thing  about  me  ?" 

"Nothing  good.  She  said  the  house  was  in  a  dis 
graceful  condition/'  I  said  heartlessly.  "And  her 
diamond  bracelet  was  stolen  while  she  took  a  nap 
on  the  kitchen  table" — he  groaned — "and — oh,  Jim, 
you  are  such  a  goose!  If  I  could  only  manage  my 
own  affairs  the  way  I  could  my  friends' !  She's  too 
sure  of  you,  Jimmy.  She  knows  you  adore  her,  and 
— how  brutal  could  you  be,  Jim  ?" 

"Fair,"  he  said.  "I  may  have  undiscovered 
depths  of  brutality  that  I  have  never  had  occasion 
to  use.  However,  I  might  try.  Why?" 

"Listen,  Jim,"  I  urged.  "It  was  always  Bella 
who  did  things  here :  she  managed  the  house,  she 
tyrannized  over  her  friends,  and  she  bullied  you. 
Yes,  she  did.  Now  she's  here,  without  your  invita 
tion,  and  she  has  to  stay.  It's  your  turn  to  bully, 
to  dictate  terms,  to  be  coldly  civil  or  politely  rude. 
Make  her  furious  at  you.  If  she  is  jealous,  so  much 
the  better." 

118 


WE    MAKE   AN    OMELET 

"How  far  would  you  sacrifice  yourself  on  the 
altar  of  friendship?"  he  asked. 

"You  may  pay  me  all  the  attention  you  like,  in 
public/'  I  replied,  and  after  we  shook  hands  we  went 
together  to  Bella. 

There  was  an  ominous  pause  when  we  went  into 
the  den.  Bella  was  sitting  by  the  register,  with  her 
furs  on,  and  after  one  glance  over  her  shoulder  at 
us,  she  looked  away  again  without  speaking. 

"Bella,"  Jim  said  appealingly.  And  then  I 
pinched  his  arm,  and  he  drew  himself  up  and  looked 
properly  outraged. 

"Bella,"  he  said,  coldly  this  time,  "I  can't  imagine 
why  you  have  put  yourself  in  this  ridiculous  posi 
tion,  but  since  you  have — " 

She  turned  on  him  in  a  fury. 

"Put  myself  in  this  position!"  She  was  frantic. 
"It's  a  plot,  a  wretched  trick  of  yours,  this  quaran 
tine,  to  keep  me  here." 

Jim  gasped,  but  I  gave  him  a  warning  glance,  and 
he  swallowed  hard. 

"On  the  contrary,"  he  said,  with  maddening 
IIQ 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

quiet,  "I  would  be  the  last  person  in  the  world  to 
wish  to  perpetuate  an  indiscretion  of  yours.  For 
it  was  hardly  discreet,  was  it,  to  visit  a  bachelor 
establishment  alone  at  ten  o'clock  at  night?  As 
far  as  my  plotting  to  keep  you  here  is  concerned,  I 
assure  you  that  nothing  could  be  further  from  my 
mind.  Our  paths  were  to  be  two  parallel  lines  that 
never  touch."  He  looked  at  me  for  approval,  and 
Bella  was  choking. 

''You  are  worse  than  I  ever  thought  you/'  she 
stormed.  "I  thought  you  were  only  a — a  fool. 
Now  I  know  yon — for  a  brute !" 

Well,  it  ended  by  Jim's  graciously  permitting 
Bella  to  remain — there  being  nothing  else  to  do — 
and  by  his  magnanimously  agreeing  to  keep  her  real 
identity  from  Aunt  Selina  and  Mr.  Harbison,  and  to 
break  the  news  of  her  presence  to  Anne  and  the  rest. 
It  created  a  sensation  beside  which  Anne's  pearls 
faded  away,  although  they  came  to  the  front  again 
soon  enough. 

Jim  broke  the  news  at  once,  gathering  every 
body  but  Harbison  and  Aunt  Selina  in  the  upper 

120 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

hall.  He  was  palpitatingly  nervous,  but  he  tried  to 
carry  it  off  with  a  high  hand. 

"It's  unfortunate,"  he  said,  looking  around  the 
circle  of  faces,  each  one  frozen  with  amazement,  and 
just  a  suspicion,  perhaps,  of  incredulity.  "It's  par 
ticularly  unfortunate  for  her.  You  all  know  how 
high-strung  she  is,  and  if  the  papers  should  get  hold 
of  it — well,  we'll  all  have  to  make  it  as  easy  as  we 
can  for  her." 

With  Jim's  eye  on  them,  they  all  swallowed  the 
butler  story  without  a  gulp.  But  Anne  was  indig 
nant. 

"It's  like  Bella,"  she  snapped.  "Well,  she  has 
made  her  bed  and  she  can  lie  on  it.  I'm  sure  I 
shan't  make  it  for  her.  But  if  you  want  to  know  my 
opinion,  Mr.  Harbison  may  be  a  fool,  but  you  can't 
ram  two  Bellas,  both  nee  Knowles,  down  Miss  Caru- 
thers'  throat  with  a  stick.'" 

We  had  not  thought  of  that  before  and  every  one 
looked  blank.  Finally,  however,  Jim  said  Bella's 
middle  name  was  Constantia,  and  we  decided  to  call 
her  that.  But  it  turned  out  afterward  that  nobody 

121 


WHEN   A]   MAN    MARRIES 

could  remember  it  in  a  hurry,  and  generally  when  we 
wanted  to  attract  her  attention,  we  walked  across 
the  room  and  touched  her  on  the  shoulder.  It  was 
quicker  and  safer. 

The  name  decided,  we  went  down-stairs  in  a  line 
to  welcome  Bella,  to  try  to  make  her  feel  at  home, 
and  to  forget  her  deplorable  situation.  Leila  had 
worked  herself  into  a  really  sympathetic  frame  of 
mind. 

"Poor  dear,"  she  said,  on  the  way  down.  "Now 
don't  grin,  anybody,  just  be  cordial  and  glad  to  see 
her.  I  hope  she  doesn't  cry:  you  know  the  spells 
she  takes." 

We  stopped  outside  the  door,  and  everybody  tried 
to  look  cheerful  and  sympathetic  and  not  grinny — 
which  was  as  hard  as  looking  as  if  we  had  had  a  cup 
of  tea — and  then  Jim  threw  the  door  open  and  we 
filed  in. 

Bella  was  comfortably  reading  by  the  fire.  She 
had  her  feet  up  on  a  stool  and  a  pillow  behind  her 
head.  She  did  not  even  look  at  us  for  a  minute ;  then 
she  merely  glanced  up  as  she  turned  a  page. 

122 


"  I  DON'T  KNOW  THAT  I  EVER  SAW  ONE,      HE  SAID 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Dear  me,"  she  said  mockingly,  "what  a  lot  of 
frumps  you  all  are!  I  had  hoped  it  was  some  one 
with  my  breakfast." 

Then  she  went  on  reading.  As  Leila  said  after 
ward,  that  kind  of  person  ought  to  be  divorced. 

Aunt  Selina  came  down  just  then  and  I  left  every 
body  trying  to  explain  Bella's  presence  to  her,  and 
fled  to  the  kitchen.  The  Harbison  man  appeared 
while  I  was  sitting  hopelessly  in  front  of  the  gas 
range,  and  showed  me  about  it. 

"I  don't  know  that  I  ever  saw  one,"  he  said  cheer 
fully,  "but  I  know  the  theory.  Likewise,  by  the 
same  token,  this  tea-kettle,  set  on  the  flame,  \vill 
boil.  That  is  not  theory,  however.  That  is  early 
knowledge.  Tolly,  put  the  kettle  on ;  we'll  all  take 
tea.'  Look  at  that,  Mrs.  Wilson.  I  didn't  fight 
bacilli  with  boiled  water  at  Chickamauga  for  noth 
ing." 

And  then  he  let  out  the  policeman  and  brought 
him  into  the  kitchen.  He  was  a  large  man,  and  his 
face  was  a  curious  mixture  of  amazement,  alarm 
and  dignity.  No  doubt  we  did  look  queer,  still  in 

124 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

parts  of  our  evening  clothes  and  I  in  the  white  silk 
and  lace  petticoat  that  belonged  under  my  gown, 
with  a  yellow  and  black  pajama  coat  of  Jimmy's 
as  a  sort  of  breakfast  jacket. 

"This  is  Officer  Flannigan,"  Mr.  Harbison  said. 
"I  explained  our  unfortunate  position  earlier  in  the 
morning,  and  he  is  prepared  to  accept  our  hospital 
ity.  Flannigan,  every  person  in  this  house  has  got 
to  work,  as  I  also  explained  to  you.  You  are  ap 
pointed  dish-washer  and  scullery-maid." 

The  policeman  looked  dazed.  Then,  slowly,  like 
dawn  over  a  sleeping  lake,  a  light  of  comprehension 
grew  in  his  face. 

"Sure,"  he  said,  laying  his  helmet  on  the  table. 
"I'll  be  glad  to  be  doing  anything  I  can  to  help.  Me 
and  Mrs.  Wilson — we  used  to  be  friends.  It's  many 
the  time  I've  opened  the  carriage  door  for  her,  and 
she  with  her  head  in  the  air,  and  for  all  that,  the 
pleasant  smile.  When  any  one  around  her  was  hav 
ing  a  party  and  wanted  a  special  officer,  it  was  Mrs. 
Wilson  that  always  said,  'Get  Flannigan,  Officer 
Timothy  Flannigan.  He's  your  man/  " 

125 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

My  heart  had  been  going  lower  and  lower.  So 
he  knew  Bella,  and  he  knew  I  was  not  Bella,  al 
though  he  had  not  grasped  the  fact  that  I  was  usurp 
ing  her  place.  And  the  odious  Harbison  man  sat 
on  the  table  and  swung  his  feet. 

"I  wonder  if  you  know,"  he  said,  looking  around 
him,  "how  good  it  is  to  see  a  white  woman  so  per 
fectly  at  home  in  a  civilized  kitchen  again,  after  two 
years  of  food  cooked  by  a  filthy  Indian  squaw  over 
a  portable  sheet-iron  stove !" 

So  perfectly  at  home!  I  stood  in  the  middle  of 
the  room  and  stared  around  at  the  copper  things 
hanging  up  and  the  rows  of  blue  and  white  crock 
ery,  and  the  dozens  and  hundreds  of  complicated- 
looking  utensils,  whose  names  I  had  never  even 
heard,  and  I  was  dazed.  I  tried  with  some  show  of 
authority  to  instruct  Flannigan  about  gathering  up 
the  soiled  things,  and,  after  listening  in  puzzled  si 
lence  for  a  minute,  he  stripped  off  his  blue  coat  with 
a  tolerant  smile. 

"Lave  'em  to  me,  miss,"  he  said.  The  "miss" 
passed  unnoticed.  "I  mayn't  give  'em  a  Turkish 

126 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

bath,  which  is  what  you  are  describing  but  I'll  get 
the  grease  off  all  right.  I  always  clean  up  while  the 
missus  is  in  bed  with  a  young  'un." 

He  rolled  up  his  sleeves,  found  a  brown  checked 
gingham  apron  behind  the  door,  and  tied  it  around 
his  neck  with  the  ease  of  practice.  Then  he  cleared 
off  the  plates,  eating  what  appealed  to  him  as  he  did 
so,  and  stopping  now  and  again  for  a  deep-throated 
chuckle. 

"I'm  thinking"  he  said  once,  stopping  with  a 
dish  in  the  air,  "what  a  deuce  of  a  noise  there  will  be 
when  the  vaccination  doctor  comes  around  this 
mornin'.  In  a  week  every  one  of  us  will  be  nursin' 
a  sore  arrm  or  walkin'  on  one  leg,  beggin'  your  par 
don,  miss.  The  last  time  the  force  was  vaccinated, 
I  asked  to  be  done  behind  me  ear ;  I  needed  me  legs 
and  I  needed  me  arrms,  but  didn't  need  me  head 
much!" 

He  threw  his  head  back  and  laughed.  Mr.  Har 
bison  laughed  too.  Oh,  we  were  very  cheerful! 
And  that  awful  stove  stared  at  me,  and  the  kettle 
began  to  hum,  and  Aunt  Selina  sent  down  word 

127 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

that  she  was  not  well,  and  would  like  some  omelet 
on  her  tray.  Omelet ! 

I  knew  that  it  was  made  of  eggs,  but  that  was  the 
extent  of  my  knowledge.  I  muttered  an  excuse  and 
ran  up-stairs  to  Anne,  but  she  was  still  sniffling  over 
her  necklace,  and  said  she  didn't  know  anything 
about  omelets  and  didn't  care.  Food  would  choke 
her.  Neither  of  the  Mercer  girls  knew  either,  and 
Bella,  who  was  still  reading  in  the  den,  absolutely 
declined  to  help. 

"I  don't  know,  and  I  wouldn't  tell  you  if  I  did. 
You  can  get  yourself  out,  as  you  got  yourself  in," 
she  said  nastily.  "The  simplest  thing,  if  you  don't 
mind  my  suggesting  it,  is  to  poison  the  coffee  and 
kill  the  lot  of  us.  Only,  if  you  decide  to  do  it,  let 
me  know;  I  want  to  live  just  long  enough  to  see 
Jimmy  Wilson  writhe!" 

Bella  is  the  kind  of  person  who  gets  on  one's 
nerves.  She  finds  a  grievance  and  hugs  it ;  she  does 
ridiculous  things  and  blames  other  people.  And 
she  flirts. 

I  went  down-stairs  despondently,  and  found  that 
128 


WE    MAKE   AN    OMELET 

Mr.  Harbison  had  discovered  some  eggs  and  was 
standing  helplessly  staring  at  them. 

"Omelet — eggs.  Eggs — omelet.  That's  the  ex 
tent  of  my  knowledge,"  he  said,  when  I  entered. 
"You'll  have  to  come  to  my  assistance." 

It  was  then  that  I  saw  the  cook-book.  It  was 
lying  on  a  shelf  beside  the  clock,  and  while  Mr. 
Harbison  had  his  back  turned  I  got  it  down.  It 
was  quite  clear  that  the  domestic  type  of  woman 
was  his  ideal,  and  I  did  not  care  to  outrage  his  be 
lief  in  me.  So  I  took  the  cook-book  into  the  pan 
try  and  read  the  recipe  over  three  times.  When  I 
came  back  I  knew  it  by  heart,  although  I  did  not 
understand  it. 

"I  will  tell  you  how/'  I  said  with  a  great  deal  of 
dignity,  "and  since  you  want  to  help,  you  may  make 
it  yourself." 

He  was  delighted. 

"Fine !"  he  said.  "Suppose  you  give  me  the  idea 
first.  Then  we'll  go  over  it  slowly,  bit  by  bit.  We'll 
make  a  big  fluffy  omelet,  and  if  the  others  aren't 
around,  we'll  eat  it  ourselves.** 

129 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

"Well/'  I  said,  trying  to  remember  exactly,  "you 
take  two  eggs — " 

"Two !"  he  repeated.    "Two  eggs  for  ten  people !" 

"Don't  interrupt  me,"  I  said  irritably.  "If — if 
two  isn't  enough  we  can  make  several  omelets,  one 
after  the  other." 

He  looked  at  me  with  admiration. 

"Who  else  but  you  would  have  thought  of  that!" 
he  remarked.  "Well,  here  are  two  eggs.  What 
next?" 

"Separate  them,"  I  said  easily.  No,  I  didn't 
know  what  it  meant.  I  hoped  he  would;  I  said  it 
as  casually  as  I  could,,  and  I  did  not  look  at  him.  I 
knew  he  was  staring  at  me,  puzzled. 

"Separate  them!"  he  said.  "Why,  they  aren't 
fastened  together!"  Then  he  laughed.  "Oh,  yes, 
of  course !"  When  I  looked  he  had  put  one  at  each 
end  of  the  table.  "Afraid  they'll  quarrel,  I  sup 
pose,"  he  said.  "Well,  now  they're  separated." 

"Then  beat." 

"First  separate,  then  beat!"  he  repeated.  "The 
author  of  that  cook-book  must  have  had  a  mean  dis- 

130 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

position.    What's  next  ?    Hang  them  ?"    He  looked 
up  at  me  with  his  boyish  smile. 

"Separate  and  beat/'  I  repeated.  If  I  lost  a  word 
of  that  recipe  I  was  gone.  It  was  like  saying  the 
alphabet :  I  had  to  go  to  the  beginning  every  time, 
mentally. 

"Well,"  he  reflected,  "you  can't  beat  an  egg,  no 
matter  how  cruel  you  may  be,  unless  you  break  it 
first."  He  picked  up  an  egg  and  looked  at  it.  "Sepa 
rate!"  he  reflected.  "Ah— the  white  from  the— 
whatever  you  cooking  experts  call  it — the  yellow 
part." 

"Exactly!"  I  exclaimed,  light  breaking  on  me. 
"Of  course.  I  knew  you  would  find  it  out."  Then 
back  to  the  recipe — "beat  until  well  mixed ;  then  fold 
in  the  whites." 

"Fold?"  he  questioned.  "It  looks  pretty  thin  to 
fold,  doesn't  it?  I — upon  my  word,  I  never  heard 
of  folding  an  egg.  Are  you — but  of  course  you 
know.  Please  come  and  show  me  how." 

"Just  fold  them  in,"  I  said  desperately.  "It— it 
isn't  difficult."  And  because  I  was  so  transparent 

131    • 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

a  fraud  and  knew  he  must  find  me  out  then,  I  said 
something  about  butter,  and  went  into  the  pantry. 
That's  the  trouble  with  a  lie:  somebody  asks  you 
to  tell  one  as  a  favor  to  somebody  else,  and  the 
first  thing  you  know,  you  are  having  to  tell  a  thou 
sand,  and  trying  to  remember  the  ones  you  have  told 
so  you  won't  contradict  yourself,  and  the  very  person 
you  have  tried  to  help  turns  on  you  and  reproaches 
you  for  being  untruthful !  I  leaned  my  elbows  de 
spondently  on  the  shelf  of  the  kitchen  pantry,  with 
the  feet  of  a  guard  visible  through  the  high  win 
dow  over  my  head,  and  waited  for  Mr.  Harbison 
to  come  in  and  demand  that  I  fold  a  raw  egg,  and 
discover  that  I  didn't  know  anything  about  cooking, 
and  was  just  as  useless  as  all  the  others. 

He  came.  He  held  the  bowl  out  to  me  and  waved 
a  fork  in  triumph. 

"I  have  solved  it,"  he  said.  "Or,  rather,  Flanni- 
gan  and  I  have  solved  it.  The  mixture  awaits  the 
magic  touch  of  the  cook." 

I  honestly  thought  I  could  do  the  rest.  It  was 
only  to  be  put  in  a  pan  and  browned,  and  then  in 

132 


WE   MAKE   AN    OMELET 

the  oven  three  minutes.  And  I  did  it  properly,  but 
for  two  things :  I  should  have  greased  the  pan  (but 
this  was  the  book's  fault;  it  didn't  say)  and  I  should 
have  lighted  the  oven.  The  latter,  however,  was 
Mr.  Harbison's  fault  as  much  as  mine,  and  I  had 
wit  enough  to  lay  it  to  absent-mindedness  on  the 
part  of  both  of  us. 

After  that,  Aunt  Selina  or  no  Aunt  Selina,  we 
decided  to  have  boiled  eggs,  and  Mr.  Harbison 
knew  how  to  cook  them.  He  put  them  in  the  tea 
kettle  and  then  went  to  look  at  the  furnace.  And 
Officer  Timothy  Flannigan  ground  the  coffee  and 
gave  his  opinion  of  the  board  of  health  in  no  stinted 
terms.  As  for  me,  I  burned  my  fingers  and  the 
toast,  and  felt  myself  growing  hot  and  cold,  for  I 
was  going  to  be  found  out  as  soon  as  Flannigan 
grasped  the  situation. 

Then,  of  course,  I  did  the  thing  that  caused  me 
so  much  trouble  later.  I  put  down  the  toaster — at 
least  the  Harbison  man  said  it  was  a  toaster — and 
went  over  and  stood  in  front  of  the  policeman. 

"I  don't  suppose  you  will  understand — exactly," 

133 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

I  said,  "but — but  if  anything  occurs  to — to  make 
you  think  I  am  not — that  things  are  not  what  they 
seem  to  be — I  mean,  what  I  say  they  are — you  will 
understand  that  it  is  a  joke,  won't  you?  A  joke, 
you  know." 

Yes,  that  was  what  I  said.  I  know  it  sounds  like 
a  raving  delirium,  but  when  Max  came  down  and 
squizzled  some  bacon,  as  he  said,  and  told  Flannigan 
about  the  robbery,  and  how,  whether  it  was  a  joke 
or  deadly  earnest,  somebody  in  the  house  had  taken 
Anne's  pearls,  that  wretched  policeman  winked  at 
me  solemnly  over  Max's  shoulder.  Oh,  it  was 
awful ! 

And,  to  add  to  my  discomfort,  the  most  unpleas 
ant  ideas  would  obtrude  themselves.  What  was  Mr. 
Harbison  doing  on  the  first  floor  of  the  house  that 
night  ?  Ice  water,  he  had  said.  But  there  had  been 
plenty  of  water  in  the  studio !  And  he  had  told  me 
it  was  the  furnace. 

Mr.  Harbison  came  back  in  a  half-hour,  and  I  re 
membered  the  eggs.  We  fished  them  out  of  the  tea 
kettle,  and  they  were  perfectly  hard,  but  we  ate  them. 

134 


WE   MAKE   AN   OMELET 

The  doctor  from  the  board  of  health  came  that 
morning  and  vaccinated  us.  There  was  a  great  deal 
of  excitement,  and  Aunt  Selina  was  done  on  the 
arm.  As  she  did  not  affect  evening  clothes  this  was 
entirely  natural,  but  later  on  in  the  week,  when  the 
wretched  things  began  to  take,  nobody  dared  to 
limp,  and  Leila  made  a  terrible  break  by  wearing  a 
bandage  on  her  left  arm,  after  telling  Aunt  Selina 
she  had  been  vaccinated  on  the  right. 


135 


CHAPTER  VIII 


CORRESPONDENTS     DEPARTMENT 

THE  following  letters  were  found 
in  the  house  post-box  after  the 
lifting  of  the  quarantine,  and 
later  were  presented  to  me  by 
their  writers,  bound  in  white 
kid  (the  letters,  not  the  au 
thors,  of  course). 

From  Thomas  Harbison,  late 
Engineer  of  Bridges,  Peruvian 
Trunk  Lines,  South  America,  to  Henry  Llewellyn, 
care  of  Union  Nitrate  Company,  Iquique,  Chili. 

DEAR  OLD  MAN  : 

I  think  I  was  fully  a  week  trying  to  drive  out  of 
my  mind  my  last  glimpse  of  you  with  your  sickly 
grin,  pretending  to  be  tickled  to  pieces  that  the  only 

136 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

white  man  within  two  hundred  miles  of  your  shack 
was  going  on  a  holiday.  You  old  bluffer!  I  used 
to  hang  over  the  rail  of  the  steamer,  on  the  way  up, 
and  see  you  standing  as  I  left  you  beside  the  car 
with  its  mule  and  the  Indian  driver,  and  behind  you 
a  million  miles  of  soul-destroying  pampa.  Never 
mind,  Jack;  I  sent  yesterday  by  mail  steamer  the 
cigarettes,  pipes  and  tobacco,  canned  goods  and 
poker  chips.  Put  in  some  magazines,  too,  and  the 
collars.  Don't  know  about  the  ties — guess  it  won't 
matter  down  there. 

Nothing  happened  on  the  trip.  One  of  the  en 
gines  broke  down  three  days  out,  and  I  spent  all  my 
time  below-decks  for  forty-eight  hours.  Chief  en 
gineer  raving  with  D.  T.'s.  Got  the  engine  fixed  in 
record  time,  and  haven't  got  my  hands  clean  yet. 
It  was  bully. 

With  this  I  send  the  papers,  which  will  tell  you 
how  I  happen  to  be  here,  and  why  I  have  leisure  to 
write  you  three  days  after  landing.  If  the  situation 
were  not  so  ridiculous,  it  would  be  maddening. 
Here  I  am,  off  for  a  holiday  and  congratulating 

137 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

myself  that  I  am  foot  free  and  heart  free — yes,  my 
friend,  heart  free — here  I  am,  shut  in  the  house  of 
a  man  I  never  saw  until  last  night,  and  wouldn't 
care  if  I  never  saw  again,  with  a  lot  of  people  who 
never  heard  of  me,  who  are  almost  equally  vague 
about  South  America,  who  play  as  hard  at  bridge 
as  I  ever  worked  at  building  one  ( forgive  this,  won't 
you?  the  novelty  has  gone  to  my  head),  and  who 
belong  to  the  very  class  of  extravagant,  luxury- 
loving,  non-producing  parasites  (isn't  that  what  we 
called  them?)  that  you  and  I  used  to  revile  from  our 
lofty  Andean  pinnacle. 

To  come  down  to  earth :  here  we  are,  six  women 
and  five  men,  including  a  policeman,  not  a  servant 
in  the  house,  and  no  one  who  knows  how  to  do  any 
thing.  They  are  really  immensely  interesting,  these 
people :  they  all  know  each  other  very  well,  and  it  is 
"Jimmy"  here,  and  "Dal"  there— Dallas  Brown, 
who  went  to  India  with  me;  you  remember  my 
speaking  of  him — and  they  are  good-natured,  too, 
except  at  meal  times.  The  little  hostess,  Mrs.  Wil 
son,  took  over  the  cooking,  and  although  luncheon 

138 


THIS  WOULD-BE  ARTIST,   WILSON 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

was  better  than  breakfast,  the  food  still  leaves  much 
to  the  imagination. 

I  wish  you  could  see  this  Mrs.  Wilson,  Hal.  You 
would  change  a  whole  lot  of  your  ideas.  She  is  a 
thoroughbred,  sure*  enough,  and  of  course  some  of 
her  beauty  is  the  result  of  the  exquisite  care  about 
which  you  and  I — still  from  our  Andean  pinnacle — 
used  to  rant.  But  the  fact  is,  she  is  more  than  that. 
She  has  fire,  and  pluck,  no  end.  If  you  could  have 
seen  her  this  morning,  standing  in  front  of  a  cold 
kitchen  range,  determined  to  conquer  it,  and  had 
seen  the  tilt  of  her  chin  when  I  offered  to  take  over 
the  cooking — you  needn't  grin ;  I  can  cook,  and  you 
know  it — you  would  understand  what  I  mean.  It 
was  so  clear  that  she  was  paralyzed  with  fright  at 
the  idea  of  getting  breakfast,  and  equally  clear  that 
she  meant  to  do  it.  By  the  way,  I  have  learned  that 
her  name  was  McNair  before  she  married  this 
would-be  artist,  Wilson,  and  that  she  is  a  daughter 
of  the  McNair  who  financed  the  Callao  branch ! 

I  have  not  met  the  others  so  intimately.  There 
are  two  sisters  named  Mercer,  inclined  to  be  noisy 

140 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

— they  are  playing  roulette  in  the  next  room  now. 
One  is  small  and  dark,  almost  Hebraic  in  type, 
named  Leila  and  called  Lollie.  The  other,  larger, 
very  blonde  and  languishing,  and  with  a  decided 
preference  for  masculine  society,  even,  saving  the 
mark,  mine!  Dallas  Brown's  wife,  good  looking, 
smokes  cigarettes  when  I  am  not  around — they  all 
do,  except  Mrs.  Wilson.  Then  there  is  a  maiden 
aunt,  who  is  ill  to-day  with  grippe  and  excitement, 
and  a  Miss  Knowles,  who  came  for  a  moment  last 
night  to  see  Mrs.  Wilson,  was  caught  in  the  quar 
antine  (see  papers),  and,  after  hiding  all  night  in 
the  basement,  is  sulking  all  day  in  her  room.  Her 
presence  created  an  excitement  out  of  all  proportion 
to  the  apparent  cause. 

From  the  fact  that  I  have  reason  to  know  that 
my  artist  host  and  his  beautiful  wife  are  on  bad 
terms,  and  from  the  significant  glances  with  which 
the  announcement  of  Miss  Knowles'  presence  was 
met,  the  state  of  affairs  seems  rather  clear.  Wilson 
impresses  me  as  a  spineless  sort,  anyhow,  and  when 
the  lady  of  the  basement  shut  herself  away  from 

141 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

the  rest  to-day  and  I  happened  on  "Jimmy»"  as  tnev 
call  him,  pleading  with  her  through  the  door,  I  very 
nearly  kicked  him  down  the  stairs.  Oh,  yes,  I'll 
keep  out,  right  enough ;  it  isn't  my  affair. 

By  the  way,  after  quarantine  and  with  the  police 
man  locked  in  the  furnace-room,  a  pearl  necklace 
and  a  diamond  bracelet  were  stolen!  Just  ten  of 
us  to  divide  the  suspicion!  Upon  my  word,  Hal, 
it's  the  queerest  situation  I  ever  heard  of.  Which 
of  us  did  it?  I  make  a  guess  that  not  a  few  of  us 
are  fools,  but  which  is  the  knave?  The  worst  of  it 
is,  I  am  the  only  unaccredited  member  of  the  house 
hold! 

This  is  more  scandal  than  I  ever  wrote  in  my  life. 
Lay  it  to  circumscribed  environment,  and  the  lack 
of  twenty  miles  over  the  pampa  before  breakfast. 
We  have  all  been  vaccinated,  and  the  officious  gen 
tlemen  from  the  board  of  health  have  taken  their 
grins  and  their  formaldehyde  and  gone.  Ye  gods, 
how  we  cough ! 

The  Carlton  order  will  go  through  all  right,  I 
think.  'Phoned  him  this  morning.  If  it  does,  old 

142 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

man,  we  will  take  a  month  in  September  and  ex 
plore  the  Mercator  property. 

Do  you  know,  Hal,  I  have  been  thinking  lately 
that  you  and  I  stick  too  close  to  the  grind.  Busi 
ness  is  right  enough,  but  what's  the  use  of  spend 
ing  one's  best  years  succeeding  in  everything  except 
the  things  that  are  worth  while?  I'll  be  thirty 
sooner  than  I  care  to  say,  and — oh,  well,  you  won't 
understand.  You'll  sit  down  there,  with  the  South 
ern  Cross  and  the  rest  of  the  infernal  astronomical 
galaxy  looking  down  on  you,  and  the  Indians  chant 
ing  in  the  village,  and  you  will  think  I  have  grown 
sentimental.  I  have  not.  You  and  I  down  there 
have  been  looking  at  the  world  through  the  reverse 
end  of  the  glass.  It's  a  bully  old  world,  Hal,  and 
this  is  God's  part  of  it. 

Burn  this  letter  after  you  read  it :  I  suspect  it  is 
covered  with  germs.  Well,  happy  days,  old  man. 

Yours,  TOM 

P.  S.  By  the  way,  can't  you  spare  some  of  the 
Indian  pottery  you  picked  up  at  Callao?  I  told  Mrs. 

143 


YOUR  REPORTERS  ARE  DAMNABLY  OFFENSIVE 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

Wilson  about  it,  and  she  was  immensely  interested. 
Send  it  to  this  address.  Can  you  get  it  to  the  next 
steamer  ?— T. 

From  Maxwell  Reed  to  Richard  Burton  Bagley, 
University  Club,  New  York. 

DEAR  DICK: 

Enclosed  find  my  check  for  five  hundred,  as  per 
wager.  Possibly  you  were  within  your  rights  in 
protecting  your  bet  in  the  manner  you  chose,  but 
while  I  do  not  wish  to  be  offensive,  your  reporters 
are  damnably  so.  Yours, 

MAXWELL  REED. 

From  Officer  Flannigan  to  'Mrs.  Maggie  Flanni- 
ganf  Erin  Street. 

DEAR  MAGGIE  : 

As  soon  as  you  receive  this,  go  down  to  Mac  and 
tell  him  the  story  as  I  tell  you  hear.  Tell  him  I 
was  walkin  my  beat,  and  I'd  been  afther  seein 
Jimmy  Alverini  about  doin  the  right  thing  for  Mac 
on  Monday,  at  the  poles,  when  I  seen  a  man  hangin 

H5 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

suspicious  around  this  house,  which  is  Mr.  Wilson's, 
on  Ninety-fifth.  And,  of  coorse,  afther  chasin  the 
man  a  mile  or  more,  I  lose  him,  which  was  not  my 
fault.  So  I  go  back  to  the  Wilson  house,  and  tell 
them  to  be  careful  about  closin  up  fer  the  night, 
and  while  I'm  standin  in  the  hall,  with  all  the  swells 
around  me,  sparklin  with  jewels,  the  board  of  health 
sends  a  man  to  lock  us  all  in,  because  the  Jap  thats 
been  waiter  has  took  the  smallpox  and  gone  to  the 
hospitle.  I  stood  me  ground.  I  sez,  sez  I,  you  cant 
shtop  an  officer  in  pursute  of  his  duty.  I  rafuse  to 
be  shut  in.  Be  shure  to  tell  Mac  that. 

So  here  I  am,  and  like  to  be  for  a  month.  Tell 
Mac  theres  four  votes  shut  up  here,  and  I  can  get 
them  for  him,  if  he  can  stop  this  monkey  business. 

Then  go  over  to  the  Dago  Church  on  Webster 
Avenue  and  put  a  dollar  in  Saint  Anthony's  box. 
He'll  see  me  out  of  this  scrape,  right  enough.  Do 
it  at  once.  Now  remember,  go  to  Mac  first :  may 
be  you  can  get  the  dollar  from  him,  and  mind  what 
you  tell  him.  Your  husband, 

TIM  FLANNIGAN. 
146 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

From  me  to  mother — Mrs.  Theodore  McNair, 
Hotel  Hamilton,  Bermuda. 

DEAREST  MOTHER: 

I  hope  you  will  get  this  before  you  read  the  pa 
pers,  and  when  you  do  read  them,  you  are  not  to  get 
excited  and  worried.  I  am  as  well  as  can  be,  and  a 
great  deal  safer  than  I  ever  remember  to  have  been 
in  my  life.  We  are  quarantined,  a  lot  of  us,  in  Jim 
Wilson's  house,  because  his  irreproachable  Jap  did 
a  very  reproachable  thing — took  smallpox.  Now 
read  on  before  you  get  excited.  His  room  has  been 
fumigated,  and  we  have  been  vaccinated.  I  am  well 
and  happy.  I  can't  be  killed  in  a  railway  wreck  or 
smashed  when  the  car  skids.  Unless  I  drown  myself 
in  my  bath,  or  jump  through  a  window,  positively 
nothing  can  happen  to  me.  So  gather  up  all  your 
maternal  anxieties  and  cast  them  to  the  Bermuda 
sharks. 

Anne  Brown  is  here — see  the  papers  for  list — and 
if  she  can  not  play  propriety,  Jimmy's  Aunt  Selina 
can.  In  fact,  she  doesn't  play  at  it;  she  works.  I 
have  telephoned  Lizette  for  some  clothes — enough 

147 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

for  a  couple  of  weeks,  although  Dallas  promises  to 
get  us  out  sooner.  Now,  dear,  do  go  ahead  and  have 
a  nice  time,  and  on  no  account  come  home.  You 
could  only  have  the  carriage  to  stop  in  front  of  the 
house,  and  wave  to  me  through  a  window. 

Mother,  I  want  you  to  do  something  for  me.  You 
know  who  is  down  there,  and — this  is  awfully  deli 
cate,  Mumsy — but  he's  a  nice  boy,  and  I  thought 
I  liked  him.  I  guess  you  know  he  has  been  rather 
attentive.  Now,  I  do  like  him,  Mumsy,  but  not  the 
way  I  thought  I  did,  and  I  want  you  to — very  gently, 
of  course — to  discourage  him  a  little.  You  know 
how  I  mean.  He's  a  dear  boy,  but  I  am  so  tired  of 
people  who  don't  know  anything  but  horses  and 
motors. 

And,  oh,  yes, — do  you  remember  a  girl  named 
Lucille  Mellon  who  was  at  school  with  you  in 
Rome?  And  that  she  married  a  man  named  Harbi 
son?  Well,  her  son  is  here!  He  builds  railroads 
and  bridges  and  things,  and  he  even  built  himself 
an  automobile  down  in  South  America,  because  he 

148 


CORRESPONDENTS'    DEPARTMENT 

couldn't  afford  to  buy  one,  and  burned  wood  in  it! 
Wood!    Think  of  it! 

I  wired  father  in  Chicago  for  fear  he  would  come 
rushing  home.  The  picture  in  the  paper  of  the  face 
at  the  basement  window  is  supposed  to  be  Mr.  Har 
bison,  but  of  course  it  isn't  any  more  like  him  than 
mine  is  like  me. 

Anne  Brown  mislaid  her  pearl  collar  when  she 
took  it  off  last  night,  and  has  fussed  herself  into  a 
sick  headache.  She  declares  it  was  stolen!  Some 
of  the  people  are  playing  bridge,  Betty  Mercer  is  do 
ing  a  cake-walk  to  the  Rhapsodic  Hongroise — Jim 
has  no  every-day  music — and  the  telephone  is  ring 
ing.  We  have  received  enough  flowers  for  a  funeral 
— somebody  sent  Lollie  a  Gates  Ajar,  only  with  the 
gates  shut. 

There  are  no  servants — think  of  it,  Mumsy.  I 
wish  you  had  made  me  learn  to  cook.  Mr.  Harbison 
has  shown  me  a  little — he  was  a  soldier  in  the  Span 
ish  War — but  we  girls  are  a  terribly  ignorant  lot, 
Mumsy,  about  the  real  things  of  life. 

149 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Now,  don't  worry.    It  is  more  sport  than  camping 
in  the  Adirondacks,  and  not  nearly  so  damp. 
Your  loving  daughter, 

KATHERINE. 

P.  S. — South  America  must  be  wonderful.  Why 
can't  we  put  the  Gadfly  in  commission,  and  take  a 
coasting  trip  this  summer  ?  It  is  a  shame  to  own  a 
yacht  and  never  use  it.  K. 

This  note,  evidently  delivered  by  messenger,  was 
found  among  other  litter  in  the  vestibule  after  the 
lifting  of  the  quarantine. 

Mr.  Alex.  Dodds,  City  Editor,  Mail  and  Star : 

DEAR  D. — Can't  get  a  picture.  Have  waited 
seven  hours.  They  have  closed  the  shutters. 

McCoRD. 

Written  on  the  back  of  the  above  note. 
Watch  the  roof.  DODDS. 


CHAPTER    IX 
FLANNIGAN'S  FIND 

THE  most  charitable  thing  would 
be  to  say  nothing  about  the  first 
day.  We  were  baldly  brutal — 
that's  the  only  word  for  it.  And 
Mr.  Harbison,  with  his  beautiful  cour 
tesy — the  really  sincere  kind — tried  to  patch  up  one 
quarrel  after  another  and  failed.  He  rose  superbly 
to  the  occasion,  and  made  something  that  he  called  a 
South  American  goulash  for  luncheon,  although  it 
was  too  salty,  and  every  one  was  thirsty  the  rest  of 
the  day. 

Bella  was  horrid,  of  course.  She  froze  Jim  until 
he  said  he  was  going  to  sit  in  the  refrigerator  and 
cool  the  butter.  She  locked  herself  in  the  dressing- 
room — it  had  been  assigned  to  me,  but  that  made  no 
difference  to  Bella — and  did  her  nails,  and  took  three 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

different  baths,  and  refused  to  come  to  the  table. 
And  of  course  Jimmy  was  wild,  and  said  she  would 
starve.  But  I  said,  "Very  well,  let  her  starve.  Not 
a  tray  shall  leave  my  kitchen.'*  It  was  a  comfort  to 
have  her  shut  up  there  anyhow:  it  postponed  the 
time  when  she  would  come  face  to  face  with  Flan- 
nigan. 

Aunt  Selina  got  sick  that  day,  as  I  have  said.  I 
was  not  so  bitter  as  the  others ;  I  did  not  say  that  I 
wished  she  would  die.  The  worst  I  ever  wished  her 
was  that  she  might  be  quite  ill  for  some  time,  and 
yet,  when  she  began  to  recover,  she  was  dreadful  to 
me.  She  said  for  one  thing,  that  it  was  the  hard- 
Boiled  eggs  and  the  state  of  the  house  that  did  it, 
and  when  I  said  that  the  grippe  was  a  germ,  she  re 
torted  that  I  had  probably  brought  it  to  her  on  my 
clothing. 

You  remember  that  Betty  had  drawn  the  nurse's 
slip,  and  how  pleased  she  had  been  about  it.  She 
got  up  early  the  morning  of  the  first  day  and  made 
herself  a  lawn  cap  and  telephoned  out  for  a  white 
nurse's  uniform — that  is,  of  course,  for  a  white  uni- 


FLANNIGAN'S    FIND 

form  for  a  nurse.  She  really  looked  very  fetching, 
and  she  went  around  all  the  morning  with  a  red 
cross  on  her  sleeve  and  a  Saint  Cecilia  expression, 
gathering  up  bottles  of  medicine — most  of  it  flesh 
reducer,  which  was  pathetic,  and  closing  windows 
for  fear  of  drafts.  She  refused  to  help  with  the 
house- work,  and  looked  quite  exalted,  but  by  after 
noon  it  had  palled  on  her  somewhat,  and  she  and 
Max  shook  dice. 

Betty  was  really  pleased  when  Aunt  Selina  sent 
for  her.  She  took  in  a  bottle  of  cologne  to  bathe 
her  brow,  and  we  all  stood  outside  the  door  and  lis 
tened.  Betty  tiptoed  in  in  her  pretty  cap  and  apron, 
and  we  heard  her  cautiously  draw  down  the  shades. 

"What  are  you  doing  that  for  ?"  Aunt  Selina  de 
manded.  "I  like  the  light." 

"It's  bad  for  your  poor  eyes,"  Betty's  tone  was 
exactly  the  proper  bedside  pitch,  low  and  sugary. 

"  'Sweet  and  low,  sweet  and  low,  wind  of  the 
western  sea !'  "  Dal  hummed  outside. 

"Put  up  those  window-shades!"  Aunt  Selina's 
voice  was  strong  enough.  "What's  in  that  bottle?" 

153 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

Betty  was  still  mild.  She  swished  to  the  window 
and  raised  the  shade. 

"I'm  so  sorry  you  are  ill,"  she  said  sympathetic 
ally.  "This  is  for  your  poor  aching  head.  Now  close 
your  eyes  and  lie  perfectly  still,  and  I  will  cool  your 
forehead." 

"There's  nothing  the  matter  with  my  head,"  Aunt 
Selina  retorted.  "And  I  have  not  lost  my  faculties ; 
I  am  not  a  child  or  a  sick  cow.  If  that's  perfumery, 
take  it  out." 

We  heard  Betty  coming  to  the  door,  but  there  was 
no  time  to  get  away.  She  had  dropped  her  mask 
for  a  minute  and  was  biting  her  lip,  but  when  she 
saw  us  she  forced  a  smile. 

"She's  ill,  poor  dear,"  she  said.  "If  you  people 
will  go  away,  I  can  bring  her  around  all  right.  In 
two  hours  she  will  eat  out  of  my  hand." 

"Eat  a  piece  out  of  your  hand,"  Max  scoffed  in  a 
whisper. 

We  waited  a  little  longer,  but  it  was  too  painful. 
Aunt  Selina  demanded  a  mustard  foot  bath  and  a 
hot  lemonade  and  her  back  rubbed  with  liniment  and 

154 


FLANNIGAN'S    FIND 

some  strong  black  tea.  And  in  the  intervals  she 
wanted  to  be  read  to  out  of  the  prayer-book.  And 
when  we  had  all  gone  away,  there  came  the  most 
terrible  noise  from  Aunt  Selina's  room,  and  every 
one  ran.  We  found  Betty  in  the  hall  outside  the 
door,  crying,  with  her  fingers  in  her  ears  and  her 
cap  over  her  eye.  She  said  she  had  been  putting  the 
hot-water  bottle  to  Aunt  Selina's  back,  and  it  had 
been  too  hot.  Just  then  something  hit  against  the 
door  with  a  soft  thud,  fell  to  the  floor  and  burst, 
for  a  trickle  of  hot  water  came  over  the  sill. 

"She  won't  let  me  hold  her  hand,"  Betty  wailed, 
"or  bathe  her  brow,  or  smooth  her  pillow.  She 
thinks  of  nothing  but  her  stomach  or  her  back !  And 
when  I  try  to  make  her  bed  look  decent,  she  spits  at 
me  like  a  cat.  Everything  I  do  is  wrong.  She 
spilled  the  foot-bath  into  her  shoes,  and  blamed  me 
for  it." 

It  took  the  united  efforts  of  all  of  us — except 
Bella,  who  stood  back  and  smiled  nastily — to  get 
Betty  back  into  the  sick-room  again.  I  was  su 
premely  thankful  by  that  time  that  I  had  not  drawn 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

the  nurse's  slip.  With  dinner  ordered  in  from  one  of 
the  clubs,  and  the  omelet  ten  hours  behind  me,  my 
position  did  not  seem  so  unbearable.  But  a  new 
development  was  coming. 

While  Betty  was  fussing  with  Aunt  Selina,  Max 
led  a  search  of  the  house.  He  said  the  necklace  and 
the  bracelet  must  be  hidden  somewhere,  and  that  no 
crevice  was  too  small  to  neglect. 

We  made  a  formal  search  all  together,  except 
Betty  and  Aunt  Selina,  and  we  found  a  lot  of  things 
in  different  places  that  Jim  said  had  been  missing 
since  the  year  one.  But  no  jewels — nothing  even 
suggesting  a  jewel  was  found.  We  had  explored 
the  entire  house,  every  cupboard,  every  chest,  even 
the  insides  of  the  couches  and  the  pockets  of  Jim's 
clothes — which  he  resented  bitterly — and  found 
nothing,  and  I  must  say  the  situation  was  growing 
rather  strained.  Some  one  had  taken  the  jewels; 
they  hadn't  walked  away. 

It  was  Flannigan  who  suggested  the  roof,  and  as 
we  had  tried  every  place  else,  we  climbed  there.  Of 
course  we  didn't  find  anything,  but  after  all  day  in 

156 


'**5s^i 

JIMMY  WAS  SITTING  ON  TITE  ROOF  PLAYING  CANFIELD 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

the  house  with  the  shutters  closed  on  account  of  re 
porters,  the  air  was  glorious.  It  was  February,  but 
quite  mild  and  sunny,  and  we  could  look  down  over 
Riverside  Drive  and  the  Hudson,  and  even  recognize 
people  we  knew  on  horseback  and  in  cars.  It  was  a 
pathetic  joy,  and  we  lined  up  along  the  parapet  and 
watched  the  motor-boats  racing  on  the  river,  and 
tried  to  feel  that  we  were  in  the  world  as  well  as 
of  it,  but  it  was  very  hard. 

Betty  had  been  making  tea  for  Aunt  Selina,  and 
of  course  when  she  heard  us  up  there,  she  followed, 
tray  and  all,  and  we  drank  Aunt  Selina's  tea  and  had 
the  first  really  nice  time  of  the  day.  Bella  had  come 
up,  too,  but  she  was  still  standoffish  and  queer,  and 
she  stood  leaning  against  a  chimney  and  staring  out 
over  the  river.  After  a  little  Mr.  Harbison  put 
down  his  cup  and  went  over  to  her,  and  they  talked 
quite  confidentially  for  a  long  time.  I  thought  it 
bad  taste  in  Bella,  under  the  circumstances,  after 
snubbing  Dallas  and  Max,  and  of  course  treating 
Jim  like  the  dirt  under  her  feet,  to  turn  right  around 
and  be  lovely  to  Mr.  Harbison.  It  was  hard  for  Jim. 

158 


FLANNIGAN'S    FIND 

Max  came  and  sat  beside  me,  and  Flannigan,  who 
had  been  sent  down  for  more  cups,  passed  tea,  put 
ting  the  tray  on  top  of  the  chimney.  Jim  was  sitting 
grumpily  on  the  roof,  with  his  feet  folded  under 
him,  playing  Canfield  in  the  shadow  of  the  parapet, 
buying  the  deck  out  of  one  pocket  and  putting  his 
winnings  in  the  other.  He  was  watching  Bella, 
too,  and  she  knew  it,  and  she  strained  a  point  to  cap 
tivate  Mr.  Harbison.  Any  one  could  see  that. 

And  that  was  the  picture  that  came  out  in  the  next 
morning's  papers,  tea-cups,  cards  and  all.  For  when 
some  one  looked  up,  there  were  four  newspaper  pho 
tographers  on  the  roof  of  the  next  house,  and  they 
had  the  impertinence  to  thank  us ! 

Flannigan  had  seen  Bella  by  that  time,  but  as  he 
still  didn't  understand  the  situation,  things  were  just 
the  same.  But  his  manner  to  me  puzzled  me ;  when 
ever  he  came  near  me  he  winked  prodigiously,  and 
during  all  the  search  he  kept  one  eye  on  me,  and 
seemed  to  be  amused  about  something. 

When  the  rest  had  gone  down  to  dress  for  dinner, 
which  was  being  sent  in,  thank  goodness,  I  still  sat 

159 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

on  the  parapet  and  watched  the  darkening  river.  I 
felt  terribly  lonely,  all  at  once,  and  sad.  There 
wasn't  any  one  any  nearer  than  father,  in  the  West, 
or  mother  in  Bermuda,  who  really  cared  a  rap 
whether  I  sat  on  that  parapet  all  night  or  not,  or 
who  would  be  sorry  if  I  leaped  to  the  dirty  bricks  of 
the  next  door-yard — not  that  I  meant  to,  of  course. 

The  lights  came  out  across  the  river,  and  made 
purple  and  yellow  streaks  on  the  water,  and  one  of 
the  motor-boats  came  panting  back  to  the  yacht 
club,  coughing  and  gasping  as  if  it  had  overdone. 
Down  on  the  street  automobiles  were  starting  and 
stopping,  cabs  rolling,  doors  slamming,  all  the  mad 
dening,  delightful  bustle  of  people  who  are  foot- 
free  to  dine  out,  to  dance,  to  go  to  the  theater,  to 
do  any  of  the  thousand  possibilities  of  a  long  Febru 
ary  evening.  And  above  them  I  sat  on  the  roof  and 
cried.  Yes,  cried. 

I  was  roused  by  some  one  coughing  just  behind 
me,  and  I  tried  to  straighten  my  face  before  I 
turned.  It  was  Flannigan,  his  double  row  of  brass 
buttons  gleaming  in  the  twilight. 

160 


FLANNIGAN'S    FIND 

"Excuse  me,  miss,"  he  said  affably,  "but  the  boy 
from  the  hotel  has  left  the  dinner  on  the  doorstep 
and  run,  the  cowardly  little  divil !  What'll  I  do  with 
it?  I  went  to  Mrs.  Wilson,  but  she  says  it's  no 
concern  of  hers."  Flannigan  was  evidently  bewil 
dered. 

"You'd  better  keep  it  warm,  Flannigan,"  I  re 
plied.  "Ypu  needn't  wait;  I'm  coming."  But  he 
did  not  go. 

"If — if  you'll  excuse  me,  miss,"  he  said,  "don't 
you  think  ye'd  betther  tell  them?" 

"Tell  them  what?" 

"The  whole  thing — the  joke,"  he  said  confiden 
tially,  coming  closer.  "It's  been  great  sport,  now, 
hasn't  it  ?  But  I'm  afraid  they  will  get  on  to  it  soon, 
and — some  of  them  might  not  be  agreeable.  A  pearl 
necklace  is  a  pearl  necklace,  miss,  and  the  lady's 
wild." 

"What  do  you  mean?"  I  gasped.  "You  don't 
think — why,  Flannigan — " 

He  merely  grinned  at  me  and  thrust  his  hand 
down  in  his  pocket.  When  he  brought  it  up  he  had 

161 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Bella's  bracelet  on  his  palm,  glittering  in  the  faint 
light. 

"Where  did  you  get  it?''  Between  relief  and  the 
absurdity  of  the  thing,  I  was  almost  hysterical.  But 
Flannigan  did  not  give  me  the  bracelet;  instead,  it 
struck  me  his  tone  was  suddenly  severe. 

"Now  look  here,  miss/'  he  said :  "you've  played 
your  trick,  and  you've  had  your  fun.  The  Lord 
knows  it's  only  folks  like  you  would  play  April  fool 
jokes  with  a  fortune!  If  you're  the  sinsible  little 
woman  you  look  to  be,  you'll  put  that  pearl  collar  on 
the  coal  in  the  basement  to-night,  and  let  me  find  it." 

"I  haven't  got  the  pearl  collar/'  I  protested.  "I 
think  you  are  crazy.  Where  did  you  get  that  brace 
let?" 

He  edged  away  from  me,  as  if  he  expected  me  to 
snatch  it  from  him  and  run,  but  he  was  still  trying 
in  an  elephantine  way  to  treat  the  matter  as  a  joke. 

"I  found  it  in  a  drawer  in  the  pantry,"  he  said, 
"among  the  dirty  linen.  And  if  you're  as  smart  as 
I  think  you  are,  I'll  find  the  pearl  collar  there  in  the 
morning — and  nothing  said,  miss." 

162 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

So  there  I  was,  suspected  of  being  responsible  for 
Anne's  pearl  collar,  as  if  I  had  not  enough  to  worry 
me  before.  Of  course  I  could  have  called  them  all 
together  and  told  them,  and  made  them  explain  to 
Flannigan  what  I  had  really  meant  by  my  delirious 
speech  in  the  kitchen.  But  that  would  have  meant 
telling  the  whole  ridiculous  story  to  Mr.  Harbison, 
and  having  him  think  us  all  mad,  and  me  a  fool. 

In  all  that  overcrowded  house  there  was  only  one 
place  where  I  could  be  miserable  with  comfort.  So 
I  stayed  on  the  roof,  and  cried  a  little  and  then  be 
came  angry  and  walked  up  and  down,  and  clenched 
my  hands  and  babbled  helplessly.  The  boats  on  the 
river  were  yellow,  horizontal  streaks  through  my 
tears,  and  an  early  searchlight  sent  its  shaft  like  a 
tangible  thing  in  the  darkness,  just  over  my  head. 
Then,  finally,  I  curled  down  in  a  corner  with  my 
arms  on  the  parapet,  and  the  lights  became  more  and 
more  prismatic  and  finally  formed  themselves  into  a 
circle  that  was  Bella's  bracelet,  and  that  kept  whirl 
ing  around  and  around  on  something  flat  and  not 
over-clean,  that  was  Flannigan's  palm. 

163 


I 


CHAPTER   X 

ON    THE   STAIRS 

I  WAS  roused  by  some  one  walking 
across  the  roof,  the  cracking  of  tin 
under  feet,  and  a  comfortable  and  com 
panionable  odor  of  tobacco.  I  moved  a 
very  little,  and  then  I  saw  that  it  was  a 
man — the  height  and  erectness  told  me 
which  man.  And  just  at  that  instant  he  saw  me. 
"Good  Lord!"  he  ejaculated,  and  throwing 
his  cigar  away  he  came  across  quickly.  "Why,  Mrs. 
Wilson,  what  in  the  world  are  you  doing  here?  I 
thought — they  said — " 

"That  I  was  sulking  again?"  I  finished  disagree 
ably.    "Perhaps  I  am.  In  fact,  I'm  quite  sure  of  it." 
"You  are  not,"  he  said  severely.    "You  have  been 
asleep  in  a  February  night,  in  the  open  air,  with  less 
clothing  on  than  I  wear  in  the  tropics." 

I  had  got  up  by  this  time,  refusing  his  help,  and 

165 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

because  my  feet  were  numb,  I  sat  down  on  the  para 
pet  for  a  moment.  Oh,  I  knew  what  I  looked  like — 
one  of  those  "Valley-of-the-Nile-After-a-Flood" 
pictures. 

"There  is  one  thing  about  you  that  is  comfort 
ing,"  I  sniffed.  "You  said  precisely  the  same  thing 
to  me  at  three  o'clock  this  morning.  You  never 
startle  me  by  saying  anything  unexpected/' 

He  took  a  step  toward  me,  and  even  in  the  dusk 
I  could  see  that  he  was  looking  down  at  me  oddly. 
All  my  bravado  faded  away  and  there  was  a  queer- 
ish  ringing  in  my  ears. 

"I  would  like  to!"  he  said  tensely.  "I  would  like, 
this  minute — I'm  a  fool,  Mrs.  Wilson,"  he  finished 
miserably.  "I  ought  to  be  drawn  and  quartered,  but 
when  I  see  you  like  this  I — I  get  crazy.  If  you  say 
the  word,  I'll — I'll  go  down  and — "  He  clenched 
his  fist. 

It  was  reprehensible,  of  course ;  he  saw  that  in  an 
instant,  for  he  shut  his  teeth  over  something  that 
sounded  very  fierce,  and  strode  away  from  me,  to 
stand  looking  out  over  the  river,  with  his  hands 

1 66 


ON    THE    STAIRS 

thrust  in  his  pockets.  Of  course  the  thing  I  should 
have  done  was  to  ignore  what  he  had  said  altogether, 
but  he  was  so  uncomfortable,  so  chastened,  that, 
feline,  feminine,  whatever  the  instinct  is,  I  could  not 
let  him  go.  I  had  been  so  wretched  myself. 

"What  is  it  you  would  like  to  say?"  I  called  over 
to  him.  He  did  not  speak.  "Would  you  tell  me  that 
I  am  a  silly  child  for  pouting?"  No  reply ;  he  struck 
a  match.  "Or  would  you  preach  a  nice  little  sermon 
about  people — about  women — loving  their  hus 
bands?" 

He  grunted  savagely  under  his  breath. 

"Be  quite  honest,"  I  pursued  relentlessly.  "Say 
that  we  are  a  lot  of  barbarians,  say  that  because  my 
— because  Jimmy  treats  me  outrageously — oh,  he 
does;  any  one  can  see  that — and  because  I  loathe 
him — and  any  one  can  tell  that — why  don't  you  say 
you  are  shocked  to  the  depths?"  I  was  a  little 
shocked  myself  by  that  time,  but  I  couldn't  stop, 
having  started. 

He  came  over  to  me,  white-faced  and  towering, 
and  he  had  the  audacity  to  grip  my  arm  and  stand 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

me  on  my  feet,  like  a  bad  child — which  I  was,  I  dare 
say. 

"Don't!'*  he  said  in  a  husky,  very  pained  voice. 
"You  are  only  talking :  you  don't  mean  it.  It  isn't 
you.  You  know  you  care,  or  else  why  are  you  cry 
ing  up  here?  And  don't  do  it  again,  don't  do  it 
again — or  I  will — " 

"You  will— what?" 

"Make  a  fool  of  myself,  as  I  have  now,"  he  fin 
ished  grimly.  And  then  he  stalked  away  and  left 
me  there  alone,  completely  bewildered,  to  find  my 
way  down  in  the  dark. 

I  groped  along,  holding  to  the  rail,  for  the  stair 
case  to  the  roof  was  very  steep,  and  I  went  slowly. 
Half-way  down  the  stairs  there  was  a  tiny  landing, 
and  I  stopped.  I  could  have  sworn  I  heard  Mr. 
Harbison's  footsteps  far  below,  growing  fainter.  I 
even  smiled  a  little,  there  in  the  dark,  although  I  had 
been  rather  profoundly  shaken.  The  next  instant  I 
knew  I  had  been  wrong ;  some  one  was  on  the  land 
ing  with  me.  I  could  hear  short,  sharp  breathing, 
and  then — 

1 68 


ON    THE    STAIRS 

I  am  not  sure  that  I  struggled ;  in  fact,  I  don't  be 
lieve  I  did — I  was  too  limp  with  amazement.  The 
creature,  to  have  lain  in  wait  for  me  like  that !  And 
he  was  brutally  strong :  he  caught  me  to  him  fiercely, 
and  held  me  there,  close,  and  he  kissed  me — not 
once  or  twice,  but  half  a  dozen  times,  long  kisses 
that  filled  me  with  hot  shame  for  him,  for  myself, 
that  I  had — liked  him.  The  roughness  of  his  coat 
bruised  my  cheek:  I  loathed  him.  And  then  some 
one  came  whistling  along  the  hall  below,  and  he 
p'ished  me  from  him  and  stood  listening,  breathing 
in  long,  gasping  breaths. 

I  ran:  when  my  shaky  knees  would  hold  me,  I 
ran.  I  wanted  to  hide  my  hot  face,  my  disgust,  my 
disillusion :  I  wanted  to  put  my  head  in  mother's  lap 
and  cry;  I  wanted  to  die,  or  be  ill,  so  I  need  never 
see  him  again.  Perversely  enough,  I  did  none  of 
those  things.  With  my  face  still  flaming,  with  burn 
ing  eyes  and  hands  that  shook,  I  made  a  belated 
evening  toilet  and  went  slowly,  haughtily,  down 
the  stairs.  My  hands  were  like  ice,  but  I  was  con 
sumed  with  rage.  Oh,  I  would  show  him — that  this 

169 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

was  New  York,  not  Iquique;  that  the  roof  was  not 
his  Andean  tableland. 

Every  one  elaborately  ignored  my  absence  from 
dinner.  The  Dallas  Browns,  Max  and  Lollie  were 
at  bridge;  Jim  was  alone  in  the  den,  walking  the 
floor  and  biting  at  an  unlighted  cigar ;  Betty  had  re 
turned  to  Aunt  Selina  and  was  hysterical,  they  said, 
and  Flannigan  was  in  deep  dejection  because  I  had 
missed  my  dinner. 

"Betty  is  making  no  end  of  a  row,"  Max  said, 
looking  up  from  his  game,  "because  the  old  lady 
up-stairs  insists  on  chloroform  liniment.  Betty  says 
the  smell  makes  her  ill." 

"And  she  can  inhale  Russian  cigarettes,"  Anne 
said  enviously,  "and  gasolene  fumes,  without  turn 
ing  a  hair.  I  call  a  revoke,  Dal :  you  trumped  spades 
on  the  second  round." 

Dal  flung  over  three  tricks  with  very  bad  grace, 
and  Anne  counted  them  with  maddening  delibera 
tion. 

"Game  and  rubber,"  sfie  said.  "Watch  Dal,  Max; 
he  will  cheat  in  the  score  if  he  can.  Kit,  don't  have 

170 


DAL  FLUNG  OVER  THREE  TRICKS  WITH  VERY  BAD  GRACE 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

another  clam  while  I  am  in  this  house.  I  have  eaten 
so  many  lately  my  waist  rises  and  falls  with  the 
tide." 

"You  have  a  stunning  color,  Kit,"  Lollie  said. 
"You  are  really  quite  superb.  Who  made  that 
gown  ?" 

"Where  have  you  been  hiding,  du  kleine?"  Max 
whispered,  under  cover  of  showing  me  the  evening 
paper,  with  a  photograph  of  the  house  and  a  cross 
at  the  cellar  window  where  we  had  tried  to  escape. 
"If  one  day  in  the  house  with  you,  Kit,  puts  me  in 
this  condition,  what  will  a  month  do?" 

From  beyond  the  curtain  of  a  sort  of  alcove, 
lighted  with  a  red-shaded  lamp,  came  a  hum  of  con 
versation,  Bella's  cool,  even  tones  and  a  heavy  mas 
culine  voice.  They  were  laughing;  I  could  feel  my 
chin  go  up.  He  was  not  even  hiding  his  shame. 

"Max,"  I  asked,  while  the  others  clamored  for  him 
and  the  game,  "has  any  one  been  up  through  the 
house  since  dinner  ?  Any  of  the  men  ?" 

He  looked  at  me  curiously. 

"Only  Harbison,"  he  replied  promptly.  "Jim  has 
172 


ON    THE    STAIRS 

•been  eating  his  heart  out  in  the  den  ever  since  din 
ner;  Dal  played  the  Sonata  Apassionata  backward 
on  the  pianola — he  wanted  to  put  through  one  of 
Anne's  lingerie  waists,  on  a  wager  that  it  would 
play  a  tune ;  I  played  craps  with  Lollie,  and  Flanni- 
gan  has  been  washing  dishes.  Why?" 

Well,  that  was  conclusive,  anyhow.  I  had  had  a 
faint  hope  that  it  might  have  been  a  joke,  although 
it  had  borne  all  the  evidences  of  sincerity,  certainly. 
But  it  was  past  doubting  now ;  he  had  lain  in  wait 
for  me  at  the  landing,  and  had  kissed  me,  me,  when 
he  thought  I  was  Jimmy's  wife.  Oh,  I  must  have 
been  very  light,  very  contemptible,  if  that  was  what 
he  thought  of  me ! 

I  went  into  the  library  and  got  a  book,  but  it  was 
impossible  to  read,  with  Jimmy  lying  on  the  couch 
giving  vent  to  something  between  a  sigh  and  a 
groan  every  few  minutes.  About  eleven  the  cards 
stopped,  and  Bella  said  she  would  read  palms.  She 
began  with  Mr.  Harbison,  because  she  declared  he 
had  a  wonderful  hand,  full  of  possibilities :  she  said 
he  should  have  been  a  great  inventor  or  a  play- 

173 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

wright,  and  that  his  attitude  to  women  was  one  of 
homage,  respect,  almost  reverence.  He  had  the 
courage  to  look  at  me,  and  if  a  glance  could  have 
killed  he  would  have  withered  away. 

When  Jimmy  proffered  his  hand,  she  looked  at  it 
icily.  Of  course  she  could  not  refuse,  with  Mr.  Har 
bison  looking  on. 

"Rather  negative,"  she  said  coldly.  "The  lines 
are  obscured  by  cushions  of  flesh;  no  heart  line  at 
all,  mentality  small,  self-indulgence  and  irritability 
very  marked.'* 

Jim  held  his  palm  up  to  the  light  and  stared  at  it. 

"Gad!"  he  said.  "Hardly  safe  for  me  to  go 
around  without  gloves,  is  it?" 

It  was  all  well  enough  for  Jim  to  laugh,  but  he 
was  horribly  hurt.  He  stood  around  for  a  few  min 
utes,  talking  to  Anne,  but  as  soon  as  he  could  he 
slid  away  and  went  to  bed.  He  looked  very  badly 
the  next  morning,  as  though  he  had  not  slept,  and 
his  clothes  quite  hung  on  him.  He  was  actually 
thinner.  But  that  is  ahead  of  the  story. 

Max  came  to  me  while  the  others  were  sitting 


ON   THE   STAIRS 

around  drinking  night-caps,  and  asked  me  in  a  low 
tone,  if  he  could  see  me  in  the  den :  he  wanted  to  ask 
me  something.  Dal  overheard. 

"Ask  her  here,"  he  said.    "We  all  know  what  it 
is,  Max.    Go  ahead  and  we'll  coach  you." 
•     "Will  you  coach  me?' '  I  asked,  for  Mr.  Harbison 
was  listening. 

;  "The  woman  does  not  need  it,"  Dal  retorted. 
And  then,  because  Max  looked  angry  enough  really 
to  propose  to  me  right  there,  I  got  up  hastily  and 
went  into  the  den.  Max  followed,  and  closing  the 
door,  stood  with  his  back  against  it. 

"Contrary  to  the  general  belief,  Kit,"  he  began,  "I 
did  not  intend  to  ask  you  to  marry  me." 
,     I  breathed  easier.    He  took  a  couple  of  steps  to 
ward  me  and  stood  with  his  arms  folded,  looking 
down  at  me. 

,     "I'm  not  at  all  sure,  in  fact,  that  I  shall  ever  pro 
pose  to  you,"  he  went  on  unpleasantly. 
.     "You  have  already  done  it  twice.     You  are  not 
going  to  take  those  back,  are  you,  Max?"  I  asked, 
looking  up  at  him. 

175 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

But  Max  was  not  to  be  cajoled.  He  came  close 
and  stood  with  his  hand  on  the  back  of  my  chair. 
"What  happened  on  the  roof  to-night?"  he  demand 
ed  hoarsely. 

"I  do  not  think  it  would  interest  you,"  I  retorted, 
coloring  in  spite  of  myself. 

"Not  interest  me !  I  am  shut  in  this  blasted  house ; 
I  have  to  see  the  only  woman  I  ever  loved — really 
loved,"  he  supplemented,  as  he  caught  my  eye,  "pre 
tend  she  is  another  man's  wife.  Then  I  sit  back  and 
watch  her  using  every  art — all  her  beauty — to  make 
still  another  man  love  her,  a  man  who  thinks  she  is 
a  married  woman.  If  Harbison  were  worth  the 

trouble,  I  would  tell  him  the  whole  story,  Aunt  Se- 

i 
lina  be — obliterated !" 

I  sat  up  suddenly. 

"If  Harbison  were  worth  the  trouble!"  I  repeated. 
What  did  he  mean  ?  Had  he  seen — 

"I  mean  just  this,"  Max  said  slowly.  "There  is 
only  one  unaccredited  member  of  this  household: 
only  one  person,  save  Flannigan,  who  was  locked 
in  the  furnace-room,  one  person  who  was  awake  and 


ON    THE    STAIRS 

around  the  house  when  Anne's  jewels  went,  only  one 
person  in  the  house,  also,  who  would  have  any 
motive  for  the  theft." 

"Motive?"  I  asked  dully. 

"Poverty,"  Max  threw  at  me.  "Oh,  I  mean  com 
parative  poverty,  of  course.  Who  is  this  fellow, 
anyhow?  Dal  knew  him  at  school,  traveled  with 
him  through  India.  On  the  strength  of  that  he 
brings  him  here,  quarters  him  with  decent  people, 
and  wonders  when  they  are  systematically  robbed !" 

"You  are  unjust!"  I  said,  rising  and  facing  him. 
"I  do  not  like  Mr.  Harbison — I — I  hate  him,  if  you 
want  to  know.  But  as  to  his  being  a  thief,  I — think 
it  quite  as  likely  that  you  took  the  necklace." 

Max  threw  his  cigarette  into  the  fire  angrily. 

"So  that  is  how  it  is !"  he  mocked.  "If  either  of 
us  is  the  thief,  it  is  I !  You  do  hate  him,  don't  you  ?" 

I  left  him  there,  flushed  with  irritation,  and  joined 
the  others.  Just  as  I  entered  the  room,  Betty  burst 
through  the  hall  door  like  a  cyclone,  and  collapsed 
into  a  chair.  "She's  a  mean,  cantankerous  old  wom 
an!"  she  declared,  feeling  for  her  handkerchief. 

177 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"You  can  take  care  of  your  own  Aunt  Selina,  Jim 
Wilson.  I  will  never  go  near  her  again." 

"What  did  you  do?  Poison  her?"  Dallas  asked 
with  interest. 

"G — got  camphor  in  her  eyes/'  snuffed  Betty. 
"You  never — heard  such  a  noise.  I  wouldn't  be  a 
trained  nurse  for  anything  in  the  world.  She — she 
called  me  a  hussy!" 

"You're  not  going  to  give  her  up,  are  you,  Bet 
ty?"  Jim  asked  imploringly.  But  Betty  was,  and 
said  so  plainly. 

"Anyhow,  she  won't  have  me  back,"  she  finished, 
"and  she  has  sent  for — guess !" 

"Have  mercy !"  Dal  cried,  dropping  to  his  knees. 
"Oh,  fair  ministering  angel,  she  has  not  sent  for 
me!" 

"No,"  Betty  said  maliciously.  "She  wants  Bella 
— she's  crazy  about  her." 


CHAPTER    XI 

I    MAKE   A   DISCOVERY 

REALLY,  I  have  left  Aunt  Se- 
lina  rather  out  of  it,  but  she  was 
important  as  a  cause,  not  as  a 
result;  at  least  at  first.  She 
came  out  strong  later.  I  be- 
[lieve  she  was  a  very  nice  old 
woman,  with  strong  likes  and 
prejudices,  which  she  was  per 
fectly  willing  to  pay  for.  At  least, 
I  only  presume  she  had  likes ;  I  know  she  had  preju 
dices. 

Nobody  ever  understood  why  Bella  consented  to 
take  Betty's  place  with  Aunt  Selina.  As  for  me,  I 
was  too  much  engrossed  with  my  own  affairs  to  pay 
the  invalid  much  attention.  Once  or  twice  during 
the  day  I  had  stopped  in  to  see  her,  and  had  been  re 
ceived  frigidly  and  with  marked  disapproval.  I  was 

179 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

in  disgrace,  of  course,  after  the  scene  in  the  dining- 
room  the  night  before.  I  had  stood  like  a  naughty 
child,  just  inside  the  door,  and  replied  meekly  when 
she  said  the  pillows  were  overstuffed,  and  why 
didn't  I  have  the  linen  slips  rinsed  in  starch  water? 
She  laid  the  blame  of  her  illness  on  me,  as  I  have 
said  before,  and  she  made  Jim  read  to  her  in  the 
afternoon  from  a  book  she  carried  with  her,  Coals 
of  Fire  on  the  Domestic  Hearth,  marking  places  for 
me  to  read. 

She  sent  for  me  that  night,  just  as  I  had  taken  off 
my  gown ;  so  I  threw  on  a  dressing-gown  and  went 
in.  To  my  horror,  Jim  was  already  there.  At  a 
gesture  from  Aunt  Selina,  he  closed  the  door  into 
the  hall  and  tiptoed  back  beside  the  bed,  where  he 
sat  staring  at  the  figures  on  the  silk  comfort. 

Aunt  Selina's  first  words  were : 

"Where's  that  flibberty-gibbet  ?" 

Jim  looked  at  me. 

"She  must  mean  Betty,"  I  explained.  "She  has 
gone  to  bed,  I  think." 

"Don't  —  let  —  her  —  in  — this — room — again," 
180 


"  MY  BREASTPIN,   CUFF-BUTTONS,   WATCH,   MONEY— TAKEN, 
WITH   THE  DOORS  LOCKED" 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

she  said,  with  awful  emphasis.  "She  is  an  infamous 
creature/' 

"Oh,  come  now,  Aunt  Selina,"  Jim  broke  in; 
"she's  foolish,  perhaps,  but  she's  a  nice  little  thing." 
Aunt  Selina's  face  was  a  curious  study.  Then  she 
raised  herself  on  her  elbow,  and,  taking  a  flat 
chamois-skin  bag  from  under  her  pillow,  held  it  out. 

"My  cameo  breastpin,"  she  said  solemnly;  "my 
cuff-buttons  with  gold  rims  and  storks  painted  on 
china  in  the  middle;  my  watch,  that  has  put  me  to 
bed  and  got  me  up  for  forty  years,  and  my  money — 
five  hundred  and  ten  dollars  and  forty  cents ! — taken 
with  the  doors  locked  under  my  nose."  Which  was 
ambiguous,  but  forcible. 

"But,  good  gracious,  Miss  Car — Aunt  Selina!"  I 
exclaimed,  "you  don't  think  Betty  Mercer  took  those 
things?" 

"No,"  she  said  grimly;  "I  think  I  probably  got 
up  in  my  sleep  and  lighted  the  fire  with  them,  or 
sent  'em  out  for  a  walk."  Then  she  stuffed  the  bag 
away  and  sat  up  resolutely  in  bed. 

"Have  you  made  up?"  she  demanded,  looking 
182 


I    MAKE   A   DISCOVERY 

from  one  to  the  other  of  us.  "Bella,  don't  tell  me 
you  still  persist  in  that  nonsense." 

"What  nonsense?"  I  asked,  getting  ready  to  run. 

"That  you  do  not  love  him." 

"Him?" 

"James,"  she  snapped  irritably.  "Do  you  suppose 
I  mean  the  policeman  ?" 

I  looked  over  at  Jimmy.  She  had  got  me  by  the 
hand,  and  Jimmy  was  making  frantic  gestures  to 
tell  her  the  whole  thing  and  be  done  with  it.  But  I 
had  gone  too  far.  The  mill  of  the  gods  had  crushed 
me  already,  and  I  didn't  propose  to  be  drawn  out 
hideously  mangled  and  held  up  as  an  example  for 
the  next  two  or  three  weeks,  although  it  was  clear 
enough  that  Aunt  Selina  disapproved  of  me  thor 
oughly,  and  would  have  been  glad  enough  to  find 
that  no  tie  save  the  board  of  health  held  us  to 
gether.  And  then  Bella  came  in,  and  you  wouldn't 
have  known  her.  She  had  put  on  a  straight  white 
woolen  wrapper,  and  she  had  her  hair  in  two  long 
braids  down  her  back.  She  looked  like  a  nice,  wide- 
eyed  little  girl  in  her  teens,  and  she  had  some  lob- 

183 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

ster  salad  and  a  glass  of  port  on  a  tray.  When  she 
saw  the  situation  she  put  the  things  down  and  had 
the  nastiness  to  stay  and  listen. 

"I'm  not  blind/'  Aunt  Selina  said,  with  one  eye 
on  the  tray.  "You  two  silly  children  adore  each 
other ;  I  saw  some  things  last  night." 

Bella  took  a  step  forward;  then  she  stopped  and 
shrugged  her  shoulders.  Jim  was  purple. 

"I  saw  you  kiss  her  in  the  dining-room,  remem 
ber  that !"  Aunt  Selina  went  on,  giving  the  screw 
another  turn. 

It  was  Bella's  turn  to  be  excited.  She  gave  me 
one  awful  stare,  then  she  fixed  her  eyes  on  Jim. 

"Besides,"  Aunt  Selina  went  on,  "you  told  me  to 
day  that  you  loved  her.  Don't  deny  it,  James." 

Bella  couldn't  keep  quiet  another  instant.  She 
came  over  and  stood  at  the  foot  of  the  bed. 

"Please  don't  excite  yourself,  dear  Miss  Caru- 
thers,"  she  said,  in  a  voice  like  ice.  "Every  one 
knows  that  he  loves  her ;  he  simply  overflows  with  it. 
It — it  is  quite  a  by-word  among  their  friends.  They 
have  been  sitting  together  in  a  corner  all  evening." 


I    MAKE   A   DISCOVERY 

Yes,  that  was  what  she  said;  when  I  had  not 
spoken  to  Jimmy  the  whole  time  in  the  den.  Bella 
was  cattish,  and  she  was  jealous,  too.  I  turned  on 
my  heel  and  went  to  the  door ;  then  I  turned  to  her, 
with  my  hand  on  the  knob. 

"You  have  been  misinformed,"  I  said  coldly. 
"You  can  not  possibly  know,  having  spent  three 
hours  in  a  corner  yourself — with  Mr.  Harbison."  I 
abhor  jealousy  in  a  woman. 

Well,  Aunt  Selina  ate  all  the  lobster  salad,  and 
drank  the  port  after  Bella  had  told  her  it  was  beef, 
iron  and  wine,  and  she  slept  all  night,  and  was  able 
to  sit  up  in  a  chair  the  next  day,  and  was  so  infatu 
ated  with  Bella  that  she  would  not  let  her  out  of  her 
sight.  But  that  is  ahead  of  the  story. 

At  midnight  the  house  was  fairly  quiet,  except  for 
Jim,  who  kept  walking  around  the  halls  because  he 
couldn't  sleep.  I  got  up  at  last  and  ordered  him  to 
bed,  and  he  had  the  audacity  to  have  a  grievance 
with  me. 

"Look  at  my  situation  now !"  he  said,  sitting  pen 
sively  on  a  steam  radiator.  "Aunt  Selina  is  crazy. 

185 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

I  only  kissed  your  hand,  anyhow,  and  I  don't  know 
why  you  sat  in  the  den  all  evening ;  you  might  have 
known  that  Bella  would  notice  it.  Why  couldn't 
you  leave  me  alone  to  my  misery  ?" 

"Very  well,"  I  said,  much  offended.  "After  this 
I  shall  sit  with  Flannigan  in  the  kitchen.  He  is  the 
only  gentleman  in  the  house." 

I  left  him  babbling  apologies  and  went  to  bed,  but 
I  had  an  uncomfortable  feeling  that  Bella  had  been 
a  witness  to  our  conversation,  for  the  door  into 
Aunt  Selina's  room  closed  softly  as  I  passed. 

I  knew  beforehand  that  I  was  not  going  to  sleep. 
The  instant  I  turned  out  the  light  the  nightmare 
events  of  the  evening  ranged  themselves  in  a  proces 
sion,  or  a  series  of  tableaux,  one  after  the  other: 
Flannigan  on  the  roof,  with  the  bracelet  on  his  palm, 
looking  accusingly  at  me;  Mr.  Harbison  and  the 
scene  on  the  roof,  with  my  flippancy ;  and  the  result 
of  that  flippancy — the  man  on  the  stairs,  the  arms 
that  held  me,  the  terrible  kisses  that  had  scorched 
my  lips — it  was  awful !  And  then  the  absurd  situa 
tion  across  Aunt  Selina's  bed,  and  Bella's  face !  Oh, 

1 86 


I    MAKE   A   DISCOVERY 

it  was  all  so  ridiculous — my  having  thought  that  the 
Harbison  man  was  a  gentleman,  and  finding  him  a 
cad,  and  worse.  It  was  excruciatingly  funny.  I 
quite  got  a  headache  from  laughing;  indeed  I 
laughed  until  I  found  I  was  crying,  and  then  I  knew 
I  was  going  to  have  an  attack  of  strangulated  emo 
tion,  called  hysteria.  So  I  got  up  and  turned  on  all 
the  lights,  and  bathed  my  face  with  cologne,  and 
felt  better. 

But  I  did  not  go  to  sleep.  When  the  hall  clock 
chimed  two,  I  discovered  I  was  hungry.  I  had  had 
nothing  since  luncheon,  and  even  the  thirst  following 
the  South  American  goulash  was  gone.  There  was 
probably  something  to  eat  in  the  pantry,  and  if  there 
was  not,  I  was  quite  equal  to  going  to  the  basement. 

As  it  happened,  however,  I  found  a  very  orderly 
assortment  of  left-overs  and  a  pitcher  of  milk,  which 
had  no  business  there,  in  the  pantry,  and  with  plenty 
of  light  I  was  not  at  all  frightened. 

I  ate  bread  and  butter  and  drank  milk,  and  was 
fast  becoming  a  rational  person  again ;  I  had  pulled 
out  one  of  the  drawers  part  way,  and  with  a  tray 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

across  the  corner  I  had  improvised  a  comfortable 
seat.  And  then  I  noticed  that  the  drawer  was  full  of 
soiled  napkins,  and  I  remembered  the  bracelet.  I 
hardly  know  why  I  decided  to  go  through  the 
drawer  again,  after  Flannigan  had  already  done  it, 
but  I  did.  I  finished  my  milk  and  then,  getting 
down  on  my  knees,  I  proceeded  systematically  to 
empty  the  drawer.  I  took  out  perhaps  a  dozen  nap 
kins  and  as  many  doilies  without  finding  anything. 
Then  I  took  out  a  large  tray  cloth,  and  there  was 
something  on  it  that  made  me  look  farther.  One 
corner  of  it  had  been  scorched,  the  clear  and  well 
defined  imprint  of  a  lighted  cigarette  or  cigar,  a 
blackened  streak  that  trailed  off  into  a  brown  and 
yellow.  I  had  a  queer,  trembly  feeling,  as  if  I  were 
on  the  brink  of  a  discovery — perhaps  Anne's  pearls, 
or  the  cuff-buttons  with  storks  painted  on  china  in 
the  center.  But  the  only  thing  I  found,  down  in  the 
corner  of  the  drawer,  was  a  half-burned  cigarette. 

To  me,  it  seemed  quite  enough.  It  was  one  of  the 
South  American  cigarettes,  with  a  tobacco  wrapper 
instead  of  paper,  that  Mr.  Harbison  smoked. 

188 


CHAPTER    XII 


THE   ROOF   GARDEN 


I  WAS  quite  ill  the  next  morning 
— from  excitement,  I  suppose. 
Anyhow,  I  did  not  get  up,  and 
there  wasn't  any  breakfast.  Jim 
said  he  roused  Flannigan  at 
eight  o'clock,  to  go  down 
and  get  the  fire  started,  and 
then  went  back  to  bed.  But 
Flannigan  did  not  get  up.  He  appeared,  sheepishly, 
at  half-past  ten,  and  by  that  time  Bella  was  down, 
in  a  towering  rage,  and  had  burned  her  hand  and  got 
the  fire  started,  and  had  taken  up  a  tray  for  Aunt  Se- 
lina  and  herself. 

As  the  others  straggled  down  they  boiled  them 
selves  eggs  or  ate  fruit,  and  nobody  put  anything 
away.  Lollie  Mercer  made  me  some  tea  and 
scorched  toast,  and  brought  it,  about  eleven  o'clock. 

189 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

"I  never  saw  such  a  house,"  she  declared.  "A 
dozen  housemaids  couldn't  put  it  in  order.  Why 
should  every  man  that  smokes  drop  ashes  wherever 
he  happens  to  be?" 

"That's  the  question  of  the  ages,"  I  replied  lan 
guidly.  "What  was  Max  talking  so  horribly  about 
a  little  while  ago?"  Lollie  looked  up  aggrieved. 

"About  nothing  at  all,"  she  declared.  "Anne  told 
me  to  clean  the  bath-tubs  with  oil,  and  I  did  it,  that's 
all.  Now  Max  says  he  couldn't  get  it  off,  and  his 
clothes  stick  to  him,  and  if  he  should  forget  and 
strike  a  match  in  the — in  the  usual  way,  he  would 
explode.  He  can  clean  his  own  tub  to-morrow," 
she  finished  vindictively. 

At  noon  Jim  came  in  to  see  me,  bringing  Anne  as 
a  concession  to  Bella.  He  was  in  a  rage,  and  he 
carried  the  morning  paper  like  a  club  in  his  hand. 

"What  sort  of  a  newspaper  lie  would  you  call 
this?"  he  demanded  irritably.  "It  makes  me  crazy; 
everybody  with  a  mental  image  of  me  leaning  over 
the  parapet  of  the  roof,  waving  a  board,  with  the 

190 


WHAT  WAS  MAX  TALKING  SO  HORRIBLY  ABOUT  ?" 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

rest  of  you  sitting  on  my  legs  to  keep  me  from  over 
balancing!" 

"Maybe  there's  a  picture!"  Anne  said  hopefully. 

Jim  looked. 

"No  picture,"  he  announced.  "I  wonder  why 
they  restrained  themselves!  I  wish  Bella  would 
keep  off  the  roof,"  he  added,  with  fresh  access  of 
rage,  "or  wear  a  mask  or  veil.  One  of  those  fel 
lows  is  going  to  recognize  her,  and  there'll  be  the 
deuce  to  pay." 

"When  you  are  all  through  discussing  this  thing, 
perhaps  you  will  tell  me  what  is  the  matter,"  I  re 
marked,  from  my  couch.  "Why  did  you  lean  over 
the  parapet,  Jim,  and  who  sat  on  your  legs  ?" 

"I  didn't;  nobody  did,"  he  retorted,  waving  the 
newspaper.  "It's  a  lie  out  of  the  whole  cloth,  that's 
what  it  is.  I  asked  you  girls  to  be  decent  to  those 
reporters ;  it  never  pays  to  offend  a  newspaper  man. 
Listen  to  this,  Kit." 

He  read  the  article  rapidly,  furiously,  pausing 
every  now  and  then  to  make  an  exasperated  com 
ment. 

192 


THE    ROOF   GARDEN 

ATTEMPT  AT  ESCAPE  FRUSTRATED 
MEMBERS  OF  THE  FOUR  HUNDRED  DEFY  THE  LAW 

"  'Special  Officer  McCloud,  on  duty  at  the  quar 
antined  house  of  James  Wilson,  artist  and  clubman, 
on  Ninety-fifth  Street,  reported  this  morning  a  dar 
ing  attempt  at  escape,  made  at  3  A.  M.  It  is  in  this 
house  that  some  eight  or  nine  members  of  the  smart 
set  were  imprisoned  during  the  course  of  a  dinner 
party,  when  the  Japanese  butler  developed  small 
pox.  The  party  shut  in  the  house  includes  Miss 
Katherine  McNair,  the  daughter  of  Theodore  Mc- 
Nair,  of  the  Inter-Ocean  system ;  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Dal 
las  Brown,  the  Misses  Mercer,  Maxwell  Reed,  the 
well-known  clubman  and  whip,  and  a  Mr.  Thomas 
Harbison,  guest  of  the  Dallas  Browns  and  a  South 
American. 

"'  'Officer  McCloud's  story,  told  to  a  Chronicle 
reporter  this  morning,  is  as  follows :  The  occupants 
of  the  house  had  been  uneasy  all  day.  From  the 
air  of  subdued  bustle,  and  from  a  careful  inspection 
of  the  roof,  made  by  the  entire  party  during  the 

193 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

afternoon,  his  suspicion  had  been  aroused.  Noth 
ing  unusual,  however,  occurred  during  the  early 
part  of  the  night.  From  eight  o'clock  to  twelve 
McCloud  was  relieved  from  duty,  his  place  being 
taken  by  Michael  Shane,  of  the  Eighty-sixth  Street 
Station. 

"  'When  McCloud  came  on  duty  at  midnight, 
Shane  reported  that  about  eleven  o'clock  the  search 
light  of  a  steamer  on  the  river,  flashing  over  the 
house,  had  shown  a  man  crouching  on  the  parapet, 
evidently  surveying  the  roof  across,  which  at  this 
point  is  only  twelve  feet  distant,  with  a  view  of 
making  his  escape.  On  seeing  Shane  below,  how 
ever,  he  had  beat  a  retreat,  but  not  before  the  officer 
had  seen  him  distinctly.  He  was  dressed  in  even 
ing  clothes  and  wore  a  light  tan  overcoat. 

"  'Officer  McCloud  relieved  Shane  at  midnight, 
and  sent  for  a  plain-clothes  man  from  the  station- 
house.  This  man  was  stationed  on  the  roof  of  the 
Bevington  residence  next  door,  with  strict  injunc 
tions  to  prevent  an  escape  from  the  quarantined 
mansion.  Nothing  suspicious  having  occurred,  the 

194 


THE    ROOF   GARDEN 

man  on  the  roof  left  about  3  A.  M.,  reporting  to 
McCloud  below  that  everything  was  quiet.  At  that 
moment,  glancing  skyward,  one  of  the  officers  was 
astounded  to  see  a  long  narrow  board  project  itself 
from  the  coping  of  the  Wilson  house,  waver  uncer 
tainly  for  a  moment,  and  then  advance  stealthily  to 
ward  the  parapet  across.  When  it  was  within  a  foot 
or  two  of  a  resting  place,  McCloud  called  sharply  to 
the  invisible  refugee  above,  at  the  same  time  firing 
his  revolver  in  the  ground. 

"  'The  result  was  surprising.  The  board  stopped, 
trembled,  swayed  a  little,  and  dropped,  missing  the 
vigilant  officers  by  a  hair's  breadth,  and  crashing  to 
the  cement  with  a  terrific  force.  An  inspection  of 
the  roof  from  the  Bevington  house,  later,  revealed 
nothing  unusual.  It  is  evident,  however,  that  the 
quarantine  is  proving  irksome  to  the  inhabitants  of 
the  sequestered  residence,  most  of  whom  are  typical 
society  folk,  without  resources  in  themselves.  Their 
condition,  without  valets  and  maids,  is  certainly 
pitiable.  It  has  been  rumored  that  the  ladies  are 
doing  their  own  hair,  and  that  the  gentlemen  have 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

been  reduced  to  putting  their  own  buttons  in  their 
shirts.  This  deplorable  situation,  however,  is  un 
avoidable. 

"  'The  vigilance  of  the  board  of  health  has  been 
most  commendable  in  this  case.  Beginning  with  a 
wager  over  the  telephone  that  they  would  break 
quarantine  in  twenty-four  hours,  and  ending  with 
the  attempt  to  span  a  twelve-foot  gulf  with  a  board, 
over  which  to  cross  to  freedom,  these  shut-in  society 
folk  have  shown  characteristic  disregard  of  the  laws 
of  the  state.  It  is  quite  time  to  extend  to  the  mil 
lionaire  the  same  strictness  that  keeps  the  commuter 
at  home  for  three  weeks  with  the  measles;  that 
makes  him  get  the  milk  bottles  and  groceries  from 
the  gate-post  and  smell  like  dog-soap  for  a  month 
afterward,  as  a  result  of  disinfection.' ' 

We  sat  in  dead  silence  for  a  minute.  Then : 
"Perhaps  it  is  true,"  I  said.    "Not  of  you,  Jim — 

but  some  one  may  have  tried  to  get  out  that  way. 

In  fact,  I  think  it  extremely  likely." 

"Who?  Flannigan?  You  couldn't  drive  him  out. 


THE    ROOF   GARDEN 

He's  having  the  time  of  his  life.  Do  you  suspect 
me?" 

"Come  away  and  don't  fight,'*  Anne  broke  in 
pacifically.  "You  will  have  to  have  luncheon  sent 
in,  Jimmy;  nobody  has  ordered  anything  from  the 
shops,  and  I  feel  like  old  Mother  Hubbard." 

"I  wish  you  would  all  go  out,"  I  said  wearily. 
"If  every  man  in  the  house  says  he  didn't  try  to  get 
over  to  the  next  roof  last  night,  well  and  good. 
But  you  might  look  and  see  if  the  board  is  still  ly 
ing  where  it  fell." 

There  was  an  instantaneous  rush  for  the  window, 
and  a  second's  pause.  Then  Jimmy's  voice,  incredu 
lous,  awed : 

"Well,  I'll  be— blessed!    There's  the  board!" 

I  stayed  in  my  room  all  that  day.  My  head  really 
ached  and  then,  too,  I  did  not  care  to  meet  Mr. 
Harbison.  It  would  have  to  come;  I  realized  that 
a  meeting  was  inevitable,  but  I  wanted  time  to  think 
how  I  would  meet  him.  It  would  be  impossible  to 
cut  him,  without  rousing  the  curiosity  of  the  others 
to  fever  pitch;  and  it  was  equally  impossible  to  ig- 

197 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

nore  the  disgraceful  episode  on  the  stairs.  As  it 
happened,  however,  I  need  not  have  worried.  I 
went  down  to  dinner,  languidly,  when  every  one  was 
seated,  and  found  Max  at  my  right,  and  Mr.  Har 
bison  moved  over  beside  Bella.  Every  one  was 
talking  at  once,  for  Flannigan,  ambling  around  the 
table  as  airily  as  he  walked  his  beat,  had  presented 
Bella  with  her  bracelet  on  a  salad  plate,  garnished 
with  romaine.  He  had  found  it  in  the  furnace-room, 
he  said,  where  she  must  have  dropped  it.  And  he 
looked  at  me  stealthily,  to  approve  his  mendacity! 
Every  one  was  famished,  and  as  they  ate  they 
discussed  the  board  in  the  area-way,  and  pretended 
to  deride  it  as  a  clever  bit  of  press  work,  to  revive  a 
dying  sensation.  No  one  was  deceived:  Anne's 
pearls  and  the  attempt  at  escape,  coming  just  after, 
pointed  only  to  one  thing.  I  looked  around  the 
table,  dazed.  Flannigan,  almost  the  only  unknown 
quantity,  might  have  tried  to  escape  the  night  be 
fore,  but  he  would  not  have  been  in  dress  clothes. 
Besides,  he  must  be  eliminated  as  far  as  the  pearls 
were  concerned,  having  been  locked  in  the  furnace- 

198 


THE    ROOF   GARDEN 

room  the  night  they  were  stolen.  There  was  no  one 
among  the  girls  to  suspect.  The  Mercer  girls  had 
stunning  pearls,  and  could  secure  all  they  wanted 
legitimately;  and  Bella  disliked  them.  Oh,  there 
was  no  question  about  it,  I  decided :  Dallas  and  Anne 
had  taken  a  wolf  to  their  bosom — or  is  it  a  viper? — 
and  the  Harbison  man  was  the  creature.  Although 
I  must  say  that,  looking  over  the  table,  at  Jimmy's 
breadth  and  not  very  imposing  personality,  at  Max's 
lean  length,  sallow  skin,  and  bold  dark  eyes,  at  Dal 
las,  blond,  growing  bald  and  florid,  and  then  at  the 
Harbison  boy,  tall,  muscular,  clear-eyed  and  sun 
burned,  one  would  have  taken  Max  at  first  choice  as 
the  villain,  with  Dal  next,  Jim  third,  and  the  Harbi 
son  boy  not  in  the  running. 

It  was  just  after  dinner  that  the  surprise  was 
sprung  on  me.  Mr.  Harbison  came  around  to  me 
gravely,  and  asked  me  if  I  felt  able  to  go  up  on  the 
roof.  On  the  roof,  after  last  night !  I  had  to  gather 
myself  together;  luckily,  the  others  were  pushing 
back  their  chairs,  showing  Flannigan  the  liqueur 
glasses  to  take  up,  and  lighting  cigars. 

199 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"I  do  not  care  to  go,"  I  said  icily. 

"The  others  are  coming,"  he  persisted,  "and  I — 
I  could  give  you  an  arm  up  the  stairs." 

"I  believe  you  are  good  at  that,"  I  said,  looking  at 
him  steadily.  "Max,  will  you  help  me  to  the  roof?" 

Mr.  Harbison  really  turned  rather  white.  Then 
he  bowed  ceremoniously  and  left  me. 

Max  got  me  a  wrap,  and  every  one  except  Mr. 
Harbison  and  Bella,  who  was  taking  a  mass  of  in- 
digestables  to  Aunt  Selina,  went  to  the  roof. 

"Where  is  Tom  ?"  Anne  asked,  as  we  reached  the 
foot  of  the  stairs.  "Gone  ahead  to  fix  things,"  was 
the  answer.  But  he  was  not  there.  At  the  top  of 
the  last  flight  I  stopped,  dumb  with  amazement ;  the 
roof  had  been  transformed,  enchanted.  It  was  a 
fairy-land  of  lights  and  foliage  and  colors.  I  had 
to  stop  and  rub  my  eyes.  From  the  bleakness  of  a 
tin  roof  in  February  to  the  brightness  and  greenery 
of  a  July  roof  garden ! 

"You  were  the  immediate  inspiration,  Kit,"  Dal 
las  said.  "Harbison  thought  your  headache  might 
come  from  lack  of  exercise  and  fresh  air,  and  he 

200 


THE    ROOF    GARDEN 

has  worked  us  like  nailers  all  day.  I've  a  blister 
on  my  right  palm,  and  Harbison  got  shocked  while 
he  was  wiring  the  place,  and  nearly  fell  over  the 
parapet.  We  bought  out  two  full-sized  florists  by 
telephone." 

It  was  the  most  amazing  transformation.  At 
each  corner  a  pole  had  been  erected,  and  wires 
crossed  the  roof  diagonally,  hung  with  red  and 
amber  bulbs.  Around  the  chimneys  had  been  massed 
evergreen  trees  in  tubs,  hiding  their  brick-and-mor- 
tar  ugliness,  and  among  the  trees  tiny  lights  were 
strung.  Along  the  parapet  were  rows  of  geometri 
cal  boxwood  plants  in  bright  red  crocks,  and  the 
flaps  of  a  crimson  and  white  tent  had  been  thrown 
open,  showing  lights  within,  and  rugs,  wicker  chairs, 
and  cushions. 

Max  raised  a  glass  of  benedictine  and  posed  for 
a  moment,  melodramatically. 

"To  the  Wilson  roof  garden!"  he  said.  "To  Kit, 
who  inspired;  to  the  creators,  who  perspired;  and 
to  Takahiro — may  he  not  have  expired/' 

Every  one  was  very  gay;  I  think  the  knowledge 

20J 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

that  to-morrow  Aunt  Selina  might  be  with  them 
urged  them  to  make  the  most  of  this  last  night  of 
freedom.  I  tried  to  be  jolly,  and  succeeded  in  be 
ing  feverish.  Mr.  Harbison  did  not  come  up  to  en 
joy  what  he  had  wrought.  Jim  brought  up  his 
guitar  and  sang  love  songs  in  a  beautiful  tenor, 
looking  at  Bella  all  the  time.  And  Bella  sat  in  a 
steamer  chair,  with  a  rug  over  her  and  a  spangled 
veil  on  her  head,  looking  at  the  boats  on  the  river — 
about  as  soft  and  as  chastened  as  an  acetylene  head 
light. 

And  after  Max  had  told  the  most  improbable  tale, 
which  Leila  advised  him  to  sprinkle  salt  on,  and 
Dallas  had  done  a  clog  dance,  Bella  said  it  was  time 
for  her  complexion  sleep  and  went  down-stairs,  and 
broke  up  the  party. 

"If  she  only  gave  half  as  much  care  to  her  im 
mortal  soul,"  Anne  said  when  she  had  gone,  "as 
she  does  to  her  skin,  she  would  let  that  nice  Harbi 
son  boy  alone.  She  must  have  been  brutal  to  him 
to-night,  for  he  went  to  bed  at  nine  o'clock.  At 
least,  I  suppose  he  went  to  bed,  for  he  shut  himself 

202 


THE    ROOK   GARDEN 

in  the  studio,  and  when  I  knocked  he  advised  me 
not  to  come  in." 

I  had  pleaded  my  headache  as  an  excuse  for 
avoiding  Aunt  Selina  all  day,  and  she  had  not  sent 
for  me.  Bella  was  really  quite  extraordinary.  She 
was  never  in  the  habit  of  putting  herself  out  for 
any  one,  and  she  always  declared  that  the  very  odor 
of  a  sick-room  drove  her  to  Scotch  and  soda.  But 
here  she  was,  rubbing  Aunt  Selina's  back  with 
chloroform  liniment — and  you  know  how  that 
smells — getting  her  up  in  a  chair,  dressed  in  one  of 
Bella's  wadded  silk  robes,  with  pillows  under  her 
feet,  and  then  doing  her  hair  in  elaborate  puffs — 
braiding  her  gray  switch  and  bringing  it,  coronet- 
fashion,  around  the  top  of  her  head.  She  even  put 
rice  powder  on  Aunt  Selina's  nose,  and  dabbed  violet 
water  behind  her  ears,  and  said  she  couldn't  under 
stand  why  she  (Aunt  Selina)  had  never  married, 
but,  of  course,  she  probably  would  some  day ! 

The  result  was,  naturally,  that  the  old  lady 
wouldn't  let  Bella  out  of  her  sight,  except  to  go  to 
the  kitchen  for  something  to  eat  for  her.  That  very 

203 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

day  Bella  got  the  doctor  to  order  ale  for  Aunt  Se- 
lina  (oh,  yes;  the  doctor  could  come  in;  Dal  said 
"it  was  all  a-coming  in,  and  nothing  going  out") 
and  she  had  three  pints  of  Bass,  and  learned  to  eat 
anchovies  and  caviare — all  in  one  day. 

Bella's  conduct  to  Jim  was  disgraceful.  She 
snubbed  him,  ignored  him,  tramped  on  him,  and  Jim 
was  growing  positively  flabby.  He  spent  most  of 
his  time  writing  letters  to  the  board  of  health  and 
playing  solitaire.  He  was  a  pathetic  figure. 

Well,  we  went  to  bed  fairly  early.  Bella  had 
massaged  Aunt  Selina's  face  and  rubbed  in  cold 
cream,  Anne  and  Dallas  had  compromised  on  which 
window  should  be  open  in  their  bedroom,  and  the 
men  had  matched  to  see  who  should  look  at  the  fur 
nace.  I  did  not  expect  to  sleep,  but  the  cold  night 
air  had  done  its  work,  and  I  was  asleep  almost  im 
mediately. 

Some  time  during  the  early  part  of  the  night  I 
wakened,  and,  after  turning  and  twisting  uneasily, 
I  realized  that  I  was  cold.  The  couch  in  Bella's 
dressing-room  was  comfortable  enough,  but  narrow 

204 


THE    ROOF    GARDEN 

and  low.  I  remember  distinctly  (that  was  what 
was  so  maddening:  everybody  thought  I  dreamed 
it) — I  remember  getting  an  eiderdown  comfort  that 
was  folded  at  my  feet,  and  pulling  it  up  around  me. 
In  the  luxury  of  its  warmth  I  snuggled  down  and 
went  to  sleep  almost  instantly.  It  seemed  to  me  I 
had  slept  for  hours,  but  it  was  probably  an  hour  or 
less,  when  something  roused  me.  The  room  was 
perfectly  dark,  and  there  was  not  a  sound  save  the 
faint  ticking  of  the  clock,  but  I  was  wide  awake. 

And  then  came  the  incident  that  in  its  ghastly, 
horrible  absurdity  made  the  rest  of  the  people  shout 
with  laughter  the  next  day.  It  was  not  funny  then. 
For  suddenly  the  eiderdown  comfort  began  to  slip. 
I  heard  no  footstep,  not  the  slightest  sound  ap 
proaching  me,  but  the  comfort  moved;  from  my 
chin,  inch  by  inch,  it  slipped  to  my  shoulders;  aw 
fully,  inevitably,  hair-raisingly  it  moved.  I  could 
feel  my  blood  gather  around  my  heart,  leaving  me 
cold  and  nerveless.  As  it  passed  my  hands  I  gave 
an  involuntary  clutch  for  it,  to  feel  it  slip  away  from 
my  fingers.  Then  the  full  horror  of  the  situation 

205 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

took  hold  of  me;  as  the  comfort  slid  past  my  feet 
I  sat  up  and  screamed  at  the  top  of  my  voice. 

Of  course,  people  came  running  in  in  all  sorts  of 
things.  I  was  still  sitting  up,  declaring  I  had  seen 
a  ghost  and  that  the  house  was  haunted.  Dallas 
was  struggling  for  the  second  armhole  of  his  dress 
ing-gown,  and  Bella  had  already  turned  on  the 
lights.  They  said  I  had  had  a  nightmare,  and  not 
to  sleep  on  my  back,  and  perhaps  I  was  taking 
grippe. 

And  just  then  we  heard  Jimmy  run  down  the 
stairs,  and  fall  over  something,  almost  breaking  his 
wrist.  It  was  the  eiderdown  comfort,  half-way  up 
the  studio  staircase ! 


206 


CHAPTER  XIII 

HE  DOES    NOT   DENY   IT 

AUNT  SELINA  got  up  the  next  morn-' 
ing  and  Jim  told  her  all  the  strange 
things  that  had  been  happening.  She 
fixed  on  Flannigan,  of  course,  al 
though  she  still  suspected  Betty  of  her 
watch  and  other  valuables.  The  incident 
of  the  comfort  she  called  nervous  indiges 
tion  and  bad  hours. 
She  spent  the  entire  day  going  through  the  store 
room  and  linen  closets,  and  running  her  fingers  over 
things  for  dust.  Whenever  she  found  any  she  looked 
at  me,  drew  a  long  breath,  and  said,  "Poor  James !" 
It  was  maddening.  And  when  she  went  through  his 
clothes  and  found  some  buttons  off  (Jim  didn't 
keep  a  man,  and  Takahiro  had  stopped  at  his  boots) 
she  looked  at  me  quite  awfully. 

"His   mother  was   a  perfect  housekeeper/'   she 
207 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

said.  "James  was  brought  up  in  clothes  with  the 
buttons  on,  put  on  clean  shelves." 

"Didn't  they  put  them  on  him?"  I  asked,  almost 
hysterically.  It  had  been  a  bad  morning,  after  a 
worse  night.  Every  one  had  found  fault  with  the 
breakfast,  and  they  straggled  down  one  at  a  time 
until  I  was  frantic.  Then  Flannigan  had  talked  at 
me  about  the  pearls,  and  Mr.  Harbison  had  said, 
"Good  morning,"  very  stiffly,  and  nearly  rattled  the 
inside  of  the  furnace  out. 

Early  in  the  morning,  too,  I  overheard  a  scrap  of 
conversation  between  the  policeman  and  our  gentle 
man  adventurer  from  South  America.  Something 
had  gone  wrong  with  the  telephone  and  Mr.  Harbi 
son  was  fussing  over  it  with  a  screw-driver  and  a 
pair  of  scissors — all  the  tools  he  could  find.  Flan 
nigan  was  lifting  rugs  to  shake  them  on  the  roof — 
Bella's  order. 

"Wash  the  table  linen!"  he  was  grumbling.  "I'll 
do  what  I  can  that's  necessary.  Grub  has  to  be 
cooked,  and  dishes  has  to  be  washed — I'll  admit 
that.  If  you're  particular,  make  up  your  bed  every 

208 


HE    DOES    NOT   DENY    IT 

day;  I  don't  object.  But  don't  tell  me  we  have  to 
use  thirty-three  table  napkins  a  day.  What  did 
folks  do  before  napkins  was  invented?  Tell  me 
that !" — triumphantly. 

"What's  the  answer?"  Mr.  Harbison  inquired 
absently,  evidently  with  the  screw-driver  in  his 
mouth. 

"Used  their  pocket  handkerchiefs!  And  if  the 
worst  comes  to  the  worst,  Mr.  Harbison,  these  folks 
here  can  use  their  sleeves,  for  all  I  care — not  that 
the  women  has  any  sleeves  to  speak  of.  Wash 
clothes  I  will  not." 

"Well,  don't  worry  Mrs.  Wilson  about  it,"  the 
other  voice  said.  Flannigan  straightened  himself 
with  a  grunt. 

"Mrs.  Wilson !"  he  said.  "A  lot  she  would  worry. 
She's  been  a  disappointment  to  me,  Mr.  Harbison, 
me  thinking  that  now  she'd  come  back  to  him,  after 
leavin'  him  the  way  she  did,  they'd  be  like  two 
turtle-doves.  Lord !  the  cook  next  door — " 

But  what  the  cook  had  told  about  Bella  and 
Jimmy  was  not  divulged,  for  the  Harbison  man 

209 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

caught  him  up  with  a  jerk  and  sent  Flannigan, 
grumbling,  with  his  rugs  to  the  roof. 

It  did  not  seem  possible  to  carry  on  the  deception 
much  longer,  but  if  things  were  bad  now,  what 
would  they  be  when  Aunt  Selina  learned  she  had 
been  lied  to,  made  ridiculous,  generally  deceived? 
And  how  would  I  be  able  to  live  in  the  houee  with 
her  when  she  did  know?  Luckily,  every  one  was 
so  puzzled  over  the  mystery  in  the  house  that  num 
bers  of  little  things  that  would  have  been  absolutely 
damning  were  never  noticed  at  all.  For  instance, 
my  asking  Jimmy  at  luncheon  that  day  if  he  took 
cream  in  his  coffee !  And  Max  coming  to  the  rescue 
by  dropping  his  watch  in  his  glass  of  water,  and 
creating  a  diversion  and  giving  everybody  an  op 
portunity  to  laugh  by  saying  not  to  mind,  it  had 
been  in  soak  before. 

Just  after  luncheon  Aunt  Selina  brought  me  some 
undergarments  of  Jim's  to  be  patched.  She  ex 
plained  at  length  that  he  had  always  worn  out  his 
undergarments,  because  he  always  squirmed  around 
so  when  he  was  sitting.  And  she  showed  me  how 

210 


HE   DOES   NOT   DENY   IT 

to  lay  one  of  the  garments  over  a  pillow  to  get  the 
patch  in  properly. 

It  was  the  most  humiliating  moment  of  my  life, 
but  there  was  no  escape.  I  took  my  sewing  to  the 
roof,  while  she  went  away  to  find  something  else 
for  me  to  do  when  that  was  finished,  and  I  sat  with 
the  thing  on  my  knee  and  stared  at  it,  while  rebellious 
tears  rolled  down  my  cheeks.  The  patch  was  not  the 
shape  of  the  hole  at  all,  and  every  time  I  took  a 
stitch  I  sewed  it  fast  to  the  pillow  beneath.  It  was 
terrible.  Jim  came  up  after  a  while  and  sat  down 
across  from  me  and  watched,  without  saying  any 
thing.  I  suppose  what  he  felt  would  not  have  been 
proper  to  say  to  me.  We  had  both  reached  the  point 
where  adequate  language  failed  us.  Finally  he  said : 

"I  wish  I  were  dead." 

"So  do  I,"  I  retorted,  jerking  the  thread. 

"Where  is  she  now?" 

"Looking  for  more  of  these."  I  indicated  the 
garment  over  the  pillow,  and  he  wiggled.  "Please 
don't  squirm,"  I  said  coldly.  "You  will  wear  out 
your — lingerie,  and  I  will  have  to  mend  them." 

211 


"  I  WISH  I  WERE  DEAD/'  JIMMY  SAID 


HE   DOES    NOT   DENY   IT 

He  sat  very  still  for  five  minutes,  when  I  dis 
covered  that  I  had  put  the  patch  in  crosswise  instead 
of  lengthwise  and  that  it  would  not  fit.  As  I  jerked 
it  out  he  sneezed. 

"Or  sneeze,"  I  added  venomously.  "You  will 
tear  your  buttons  off,  and  I  will  have  to  sew  them 


on/" 


Jim  rose  wrathfully.  "  'Don't  sit,  don't  sneeze/  " 
he  repeated.  "Don't  stand,  I  suppose,  for  fear  I 
will  wear  out  my  socks.  Here,  give  me  that.  If  the 
fool  thing  has  to  be  mended,  I'll  do  it  myself." 

He  went  over  to  a  corner  of  the  parapet  and 
turned  his  back  to  me.  He  was  very  much  of 
fended.  In  about  a  minute  he  came  back,  trium 
phant,  and  held  out  the  result  of  his  labor.  I  could 
only  gasp.  He  had  puckered  up  the  edges  of  the 
hole  like  the  neck  of  a  bag,  and  had  tied  the  thread 
around  it.  "You — you  won't  be  able  to  sit  down," 
I  ventured. 

"Don't  have  any  time  to  sit,"  he  retorted  prompt 
ly.  "Anyhow,  it  will  give  some,  won't  it  ?  It  would 

213 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

if  it  was  tied  with  elastic  instead  of  thread.  Have 
you  any  elastic?" 

Lollie  came  up  just  then,  and  Jim  took  himself  and 
his  mending  down-stairs.  Luckily,  Aunt  Selina 
found  several  letters  in  his  room  that  afternoon 
while  she  was  going  over  his  clothes,  and  as  it  took 
Jim  some  time  to  explain  them,  she  forgot  the  task 
she  had  given  me  altogether. 

When  Lollie  came  up  to  the  roof,  she  closed  the 
door  to  the  stairs,  and  coming  over,  drew  a  chair 
close  to  mine. 

"Have  you  seen  much  of  Tom  to-day?"  she  asked, 
as  an  introduction. 

"I  suppose  you  mean  Mr.  Harbison,  Lollie,"  I 
said.  "No — not  any  more  than  I  could  help.  Don't 
whisper,  he  couldn't  possibly  hear  you.  And  if  it's 
scandal  I  don't  want  to  know  it." 

"Look  here,  Kit,"  she  retorted,  "you  needn't  be 
so  superior.  If  I  like  to  talk  scandal,  I'm  not  so 
sure  you  aren't  making  it." 

That  was  the  way  right  along:  7  was  making 
214 


HE   DOES    NOT   DENY   IT 

scandal;  7  brought  them  there  to  dinner;  7  let 
Bella  in! 

And,  of  course,  Anne  came  up  then,  and  began 
on  me  at  once. 

"You  are  a  very  bad  girl/'  she  began.  "What  do 
you  mean  by  treating  Tom  Harbison  the  way  you 
do?  He  is  heart-broken." 

"I  think  you  exaggerate  my  influence  over  him," 
I  retorted.  "I  haven't  treated  him  badly,  because 
I  haven't  paid  any  attention  to  him." 

Anne  threw  up  her  hands. 

"There  you  are !"  she  said.  "He  worked  all  day 
yesterday  fixing  this  place  for  you — yes,  for  you, 
my  dear.  I  am  not  blind — and  last  night  you  re 
fused  to  let  him  bring  you  up." 

"He  told  you!"  I  flamed. 

"He  wondered  what  he  had  done.  And  as  you 
wouldn't  let  him  come  within  speaking  distance  of 
you,  he  came  to  me." 

"I  am  sorry,  Anne,  since  you  are  fond  of  him," 
I  said.  "But  to  me  he  is  impossible — intolerable. 
My  reasons  are  quite  sufficient." 

215 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Kit  is  perfectly  right,  Anne,"  Leila  broke  in.  "I 
tell  you,  there  is  something  queer  about  him,"  she 
added  in  a  portentous  whisper. 

Anne  stiffened. 

"He  is  perfect,"  she  declared.  "Of  good  family, 
warm-hearted,  courageous,  handsome,  clever — what 
more  do  you  ask  ?" 

"Honesty,"  said  Leila  hotly.  "That  a  man  should 
be  what  he  says  he  is." 

Anne  and  I  both  stared. 

"It  is  your  Mr.  Harbison,"  Leila  went  on,  "who 
tried  to  escape  from  the  house  by  putting  a  board 
across  to  the  next  roof !" 

"I  don't  believe  it,"  said  Anne.  "You  might 
bring  me  a  picture  of  him,  board  in  hand,  and  I 
wouldn't  believe  it." 

"Don't  then,"  Lollie  said  cruelly.  "Let  him  get 
away  with  your  pearls;  they  are  yours.  Only,  as 
sure  as  anything,  the  man  who  tried  to  escape  from 
the  house  had  a  reason  for  escaping,  and  the  papers 
said  a  man  in  evening  dress  and  light  overcoat.  I 
found  Mr.  Harbison's  overcoat  to-day  lying  in  a 

216 


HE   DOES    NOT   DENY   IT 

heap  in  one  of  the  maids'  rooms,  and  it  was  covered 
with  brick  dust  all  over  the  front.  A  button  had 
even  been  torn  off." 

1  "Pooh !"  Anne  said,  when  she  had  recovered  her 
self  a  little.  "There  isn't  any  reason,  as  far  as  that 
goes,  why  Flannigan  shouldn't  have  worn  Tom's 
overcoat,  or — any  of  the  others." 

"Flannigan !"  Leila  said  loftily.  "Why,  his  arms 
are  like  piano  legs ;  he  couldn't  get  into  it.  As  for 
the  others,  there  is  only  one  person  who  would  fit, 
or  nearly  fit,  that  overcoat,  and  that  is  Dallas, 
Anne." 

While  Anne  was  choking  down  her  wrath,  Leila 
got  up  and  darted  out  of  the  tent.  When  she  came 
back  she  was  triumphant. 

"Look,"  she  said,  holding  out  her  hand.  And  on 
her  palm  lay  a  lightish  brown  button.  "I  found  it 
just  where  the  paper  said  the  board  was  thrown  out, 
and  it  is  from  Mr.  Harbison's  overcoat,  without  a 
doubt." 

Of  course  I  should  not  have  been  surprised.  A 
man  who  would  kiss  a  woman  on  a  dark  staircase 

217 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

— a  woman  he  had  known  only  two  days — was  ca 
pable  of  anything-. 

"Kit  has  only  been  a  little  keener  than  the  rest  of 
us,"  Lollie  said.  "She  found  him  out  yesterday." 

"Upon  my  word,"  said  Anne  indignantly,  prepar 
ing  to  go,  "if  I  didn't  know  you  girls  so  well,  I 
would  think  you  were  crazy.  And  now,  just  to  off 
set  this,  I  can  tell  you  something.  Flannigan  told 
me  this  morning  not  to  worry ;  that  he  has  my  pearl 
collar  spotted,  and  that  young  ladies  will  have  their 
jokes!" 

Yes,  as  I  said  before,  it  was  a  cheerful,  joy-pro 
ducing  situation. 

I  sat  and  thought  it  over  after  Anne's  parting 
shot,  when  Leila  had  flounced  down-stairs.  Things 
were  closing  in:  I  gave  the  situation  twenty-four 
hours  to  develop.  At  the  end  of  that  time  Flanni 
gan  would  accuse  me  openly  of  knowing  where  the 
pearls  were;  I  would  explain  my  silly  remark  to 
him,  and  the  mine  would  explode — under  Aunt  Se- 
lina. 

I  was  sunk  in  dejected  reverie  when  some  one 
218 


HE  DOES   NOT   DENY   IT 

came  on  the  roof.  When  he  was  opposite  the  open 
ing  in  the  tent,  I  saw  Mr.  Harbison,  and  at  that 
moment  he  saw  me.  He  paused  uncertainly,  then 
he  made  an  evident  effort  and  came  over  to  me. 

"You  are— better  to-day?" 

"Quite  well,  thank  you." 

"I  am  glad  you  find  the  tent  useful.  Does  it  keep 
off  the  wind?" 

"It  is  quite  a  shelter"— frigidly. 

He  still  stood,  struggling  for  something  to  say. 
Evidently  nothing  came  to  his  mind,  for  he  lifted 
the  cap  he  was  wearing,  and,  turning  away,  began 
to  work  with  the  wiring  of  the  roof.  He  was  clever 
with  tools;  one  could  see  that.  If  he  was  a  profes 
sional  gentleman-burglar,  no  doubt  he  needed  to  be. 
After  a  bit,  finding  it  necessary  to  climb  to  the 
parapet,  he  took  off  his  coat,  without  even  a  glance 
in  my  direction,  and  fell  to  work  vigorously. 

One  does  not  need  to  like  a  man  to  admire  him 
physically,  any  more  than  one  needs  to  like  a  race 
horse  or  any  other  splendid  animal.  No  one  could 
deny  that  the  man  on  the  parapet  was  a  splendid 

219 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

animal;  he  looked  quite  big  enough  and  strong 
enough  to  have  tossed  his  slender  bridge  across  the 
gulf  to  the  next  roof,  without  any  difficulty,  and  co 
ordinate  enough  to  have  crossed  on  it  with  a  flourish 
to  safety. 

Just  then  there  was  a  rending,  tearing  sound  from 
the  corner  and  a  muttered  ejaculation.  I  looked  up 
in  time  to  see  Mr.  Harbison  throw  up  his  arms, 
make  a  futile  attempt  to  regain  his  balance,  and  dis 
appear  over  the  edge  of  the  roof.  One  instant  he 
was  standing  there,  splendid,  superb;  the  next,  the 
corner  of  the  parapet  was  empty,  all  that  stood  there 
was  a  broken,  splintered  post  and  a  tangle  of  wires. 

I  could  not  have  moved  at  first ;  at  least,  it  seemed 
hours  before  the  full  significance  of  the  thing  pene 
trated  my  dazed  brain.  When  I  got  up  I  seemed  to 
walk,  to  crawl,  with  leaden  weights  holding  back 
my  feet. 

When  I  got  to  the  corner  I  had  to  catch  the  post 
for  support.  I  knew  somebody  was  saying,  "Oh, 
how  terrible!"  over  and  over.  It  was  only  after 
ward  that  I  knew  it  had  been  myself.  And  then 

220 


HE    DOES    NOT    DENY    IT 

some  other  voice  was  saying,  "Don't  be  alarmed. 
Please  don't  be  frightened.  I'm  all  right." 

I  dared  to  look  over  the  parapet,  finally,  and  in 
stead  of  a  crushed  and  unspeakable  body,  there  was 
Mr.  Harbison,  sitting  about  eight  feet  below  me, 
with  his  feet  swinging  into  space  and  a  long  red 
scratch  from  the  corner  of  his  eye  across  his  cheek. 
There  was  a  sort  of  mansard  there,  with  windows, 
and  just  enough  coping  to  keep  him  from  rolling 
off. 

"I  thought  you  had  fallen — all  the  way,"  I 
gasped,  trying  to  keep  my  lips  from  trembling.  "I 
— oh,  don't  dangle  your  feet  like  that!" 

He  did  not  seem  at  all  glad  of  his  escape.  He  sat 
there  gloomily,  peering  into  the  gulf  beneath. 

"If  it  wasn't  so — er — messy  and  generally  un 
pleasant,"  he  replied  without  looking  up,  "I  would 
slide  off  and  go  the  rest  of  the  way." 

"You  are  childish,"  I  said  severely.  "See  if  you 
can  get  through  the  window  behind  you.  If  you 
can  not,  I'll  come  down  and  unfasten  it."  But  the 
window  was  open,  and  I  had  a  chance  to  sit  down 

221 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

and  gather  up  the  scattered  ends  of  my  nerves.  To 
my  surprise,  however,  when  he  came  back  he  made 
no  effort  to  renew  our  conversation.  He  ignored 
me  completely,  and  went  to  work  at  once  to  repair 
the  damage  to  his  wires,  with  his  back  to  me. 

"I  think  you  are  very  rude,"  I  said  at  last.  "You 
fell  over  there  and  I  thought  you  were  killed.  The 
nervous  shock  I  experienced  is  just  as  bad  as  if  you 
had  gone — all  the  way." 

He  put  down  the  hammer  and  came  over  to  me 
without  speaking.  Then,  when  he  was  quite  close, 
He  said: 

"I  am  very  sorry  if  I  startled  you.  I  did  not  flat 
ter  myself  that  you  would  be  profoundly  affected,  in 
any  event." 

"Oh,  as  to  that,"  I  said  lightly,  "it  makes  me  ill 
for  days  if  my  car  runs  over  a  dog."  He  looked  at 
me  in  silence.  "You  are  not  going  to  get  up  on 
that  parapet  again  ?" 

"Mrs.  Wilson/'  he  said,  without  paying  the 
slightest  attention  to  my  question,  "will  you  tell  me 
what  I  have  done  ?" 

222 


HE    DOES    NOT   DENY   IT 

"Done?" 

"Or  have  not  done?  I  have  racked  my  brains — 
stayed  awake  all  of  last  night.  At  first  I  hoped  it 
was  impersonal,  that,  womanlike,  you  were  merely 
venting  general  disfavor  on  one  particular  indi 
vidual.  But — your  hostility  is  to  me,  personally." 

I  raised  my  eyebrows,  coldly  interrogative. 

"Perhaps,"  he  went  on  calmly — "perhaps  I  was 
a  fool  here  on  the  roof — the  night  before  last.  If 
I  said  anything  that  I  should  not,  I  ask  your  pardon. 
If  it  is  not  that,  I  think  you  ought  to  ask  mine !" 

I  was  angry  enough  then. 

"There  can  be  only  one  opinion  about  your  con 
duct,"  I  retorted  warmly.  "It  was  worse  than 
brutal.  It — it  was  unspeakable.  I  have  no  words 
for  it — except  that  I  loathe  it — and  you." 

He  was  very  grim  by  this  time.  "I  have  heard 
you  say  something  like  that  before — only  I  was  not 
the  unfortunate  in  that  case." 

"Oh!"    I  was  choking. 

"Under  different  circumstances  I  should  be  the 
last  person  to  recall  anything  so — personal.  But  the 

223 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

circumstances  are  unusual/'  He  took  an  angry 
step  toward  me.  "Will  you  tell  me  what  I  have 
done?  Or  shall  I  go  down  and  ask  the  others?" 

"You  wouldn't  dare,"  I  cried,  "or  I  will  tell  them 
what  you  did !  How  you  waylaid  rne  on  those  stairs 
there,  and  forced  your  caresses,  your  kisses,  on  me ! 
Oh,  I  could  die  with  shame!'' 

The  silence  that  followed  was  as  unexpected  as  it 
was  ominous.  I  knew  he  was  staring  at  me,  and 
I  was  furious  to  find  myself  so  emotional,  so  much 
more  the  excited  of  the  two.  Finally,  I  looked  up. 

"You  can  not  deny  it,"  I  said,  a  sort  of  anti 
climax. 

"No."  He  was  very  quiet,  very  grim,  quite  com 
posed.  "No,"  he  repeated  judicially.  "I  do  not 
deny  it." 

He  did  not  ?    Or  he  would  not  ?    Which  ? 


224 


CHAPTER  XIV 

ALMOST,    BUT    NOT   QUITE 

DAL  had  been  acting  strangely  all 
day.   Once,  early  in  the  evening, 
when  I  had  doubled  no  trump,  he 
led  me  a  club  without  apology, 
and  later  on,  during  his  dummy, 
I  saw  him  writing  our  names  on 
the  back  of  an  envelope,  and  put 
ting  numbers  after  them.     At  my  earliest 
opportunity  I  went  to  Max. 

"There  is  something  the  matter  with  Dal,  Max," 
I  volunteered.  "He  has  been  acting  strangely  all 
day,  and  just  now  he  was  making  out  a  list — names' 
and  numbers." 

"You're  to  blame  for  that,  Kit,"  Max  said  seri 
ously.  "You  put  washing  soda  instead  of  baking 
soda  in  those  biscuits  to-day,  and  he  thinks  he  is  a 
steam  laundry.  Those  are  laundry  lists  he's  making 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

out.  He  asked  me  a  little  while  ago  if  I  wanted  a 
domestic  finish." 

Yes,  I  had  put  washing  soda  in  the  biscuits.  The 
book  said  soda,  and  how  is  one  to  know  which  is 
meant  ? 

"I  do  not  think  you  are  calculated  for  a  domestic 
finish,"  I  said  coldly  as  I  turned  away.  "In  any 
case  I  disclaim  any  such  responsibility.  But — there 
is  something  on  Dai's  mind." 

Max  came  after  me.  "Don't  be  cross,  Kit.  You 
haven't  said  a  nice  word  to  me  to-day,  and  you  go 
around  bristling  with  your  chin  up  and  two  red 
spots  on  your  cheeks — like  whatever-her-name-was 
with  the  snakes  instead  of  hair.  I  don't  know  why 
I'm  so  crazy  about  you :  I  always  meant  to  love  a 
girl  with  a  nice  disposition." 

I  left  him  then.  Dal  had  gone  into  the  reception- 
room  and  closed  the  doors.  And  because  he  had 
been  acting  so  strangely,  and  partly  to  escape  from 
Max,  whose  eyes  looked  threatening,  I  followed 
him.  Just  as  I  opened  the  door  quietly  and  looked 
in,  Dallas  switched  off  the  lights,  and  I  could  hear 

226 


ALMOST,   BUT   NOT   QUITE 

him  groping  his  way  across  the  room.  Then  some 
body — not  Dal — spoke  from  the  corner,  cautiously. 

'Is  that  you,  Mr.  Brown,  sir?"  It  was  Flanni- 
gan. 

"Yes.    Is  everything  here  ?" 

"All  but  the  powder,  sir.  Don't  step  too  close. 
They're  spread  all  over  the  place." 

"Have  you  taken  the  curtains  down  ?" 

"Yes,  sir." 

"Matches?" 

"Here,  sir." 

"Light  one,  will  you,  Flannigan?  I  want  to  see 
the  time." 

The  flare  showed  Dallas  and  Flannigan  bent  over 
the  timepiece.  And  it  showed  something  else.  The 
rug  had  been  turned  back  from  the  windows  which 
opened  on  the  street,  and  the  curtains  had  been  re 
moved.  On  the  bare  hardwood  floor  just  beneath 
the  windows  was  an  array  of  pans  of  various  sizes, 
dish  pans,  cake  tins,  and  a  metal  foot  tub.  The 
pans  were  raised  from  the  floor  on  bricks,  and 
seemed  to  be  full  of  paper.  All  the  chairs  and  tables 

227 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

were  pushed  back  against  the  wall,  and  the  bric-a- 
brac  was  stacked  on  the  mantel. 

"Half  an  hour  yet,"  Dal  said,  closing  his  watch. 
"Plenty  of  time,  and  remember  the  signal,  four 
short  and  two  long." 

"Four  short  and  two  long — all  right,  sir." 

"And — Flannigan,  here's  something  for  you,  on 
account." 

"Thank  you,  sir." 

Dal  turned  to  go  out,  tripped  over  the  rug,  said 
something,  and  passed  me  without  an  idea  of  my 
presence.  A  moment  later  Flannigan  went  out,  and 
I  was  left,  huddled  against  the  wall,  and  alone. 

It  was  puzzling  enough.  "Four  long  and  twa 
short !"  "All  but  the  powder !"  Not  that  I  believed 
for  a  moment  what  Max  had  said,  and  anyhow 
Flannigan  was  the  sanest  person  I  ever  saw  in  my 
life.  But  it  all  seemed  a  part  of  the  mystevy  that 
had  been  hanging  over  us  for  several  days.  I  felt 
my  way  across  the  room  and  knelt  by  the  pans.  Yes, 
they  were  there,  full  of  paper  and  mounted  on 
bricks.  It  had  not  been  a  delusion. 

228 


ALMOST,    BUT    NOT    QUITE 

And  then  I  straightened  on  my  knees  suddenly, 
for  an  automobile  passing  under  the  windows  had 
sounded  four  short  honks  and  two  long  ones.  The 
signal  was  followed  instantly  by  a  crash.  The  foot 
bath  had  fallen  from  its  supports,  and  lay,  quiver 
ing  and  vibrating  with  horrid  noises  at  my  feet. 
The  next  moment  Mr.  Harbison  had  thrown  open 
the  door  and  leaped  into  the  room. 

"Who's  there?"  he  demanded.  Against  the  light 
I  could  see  him  reaching  for  his  hip  pocket,  and  the 
rest  crowding  up  around  him. 

"It's  only  me,"  I  quavered,  "that  is,  I.  The— 
the  dish  pan  upset." 

"Dish  pan!'  Bella  said  from  back  in  the  crowd. 
"Kit,  of  course!" 

Jim  forced  his  way  through  then  and  turned  on 
the  lights.  I  have  no  doubt  I  looked  very  strange, 
kneeling  there  on  the  bare  floor,  with  a  row  of  pans 
mounted  on  bricks  behind  me,  and  the  furniture  all 
piled  on  itself  in  a  back  corner. 

"Kit!  What  in  the  world — "  Jim  began,  and 
stopped.  He  stared  from  me  to  the  pans,  to  the 

229 


WHEN   rA   MAN    MARRIES 

windows,  to  the  bric-a-brac  on  the  mantel,  and  back 
to  me. 

I  sat  stonily  silent.  Why  should  I  explain? 
Whenever  I  got  into  a  foolish  position,  and  tried  to 
explain,  and  tell  how  it  happened,  and  who  was 
really  to  blame,  they  always  brought  it  back  to  me 
somehow.  So  I  sat  there  on  the  floor  and  let  them 
stare.  And  finally  Lollie  Mercer  got  her  breath  and 
said,  "How  perfectly  lovely :  it's  a  charade !" 

And  Anne  guessed  "kitchen"  at  once.  "Kit,  you 
know,  and  the  pans  and — all  that,"  she  said  vaguely. 
At  that  they  all  took  to  guessing!  And  I  sat  still, 
until  Mr.  Harbison  saw  the  storm  in  my  eyes  and 
came  over  to  me. 

"Have  you  hurt  your  ankle?"  he  said  in  an  un 
dertone.  "Let  me  help  you  up/' 

"I  am  not  hurt,"  I  said  coldly,  "and  even  if  I  were, 
it  would  be  unnecessary  to  trouble  you." 

"I  can  not  help  being  troubled,"  he  returned,  just 
as  evenly.  "You  see,  'it  makes  me  ill  for  days  if  my 
car  runs  over  a  dog.' ' 

Luckily,  at  that  moment  Dal  came  in.  He  pushed 
230 


ALMOST,    BUT    NOT    QUITE 

his  way  through  the  crowd  without  a  word,  shut 
off  the  lights,  crashed  through  the  pans  and 
slammed  the  shutters  close.  Then  he  turned  and 
addressed  the  rest. 

"Of  all  the  lunatics — !"  lie  began,  only  there  was 
more  to  it  than  that.  "A  fellow  goes  to  all  kinds 
of  trouble  to  put  an  end  to  this  miserable  situation, 
and  the  entire  household  turns  out  and  sets  to  work 
to  frustrate  the  whole  scheme.  You  like  to  stay 
here,  don't  you,  like  chickens  in  a  coop?  Where's 
Flannigan  ?" 

Nobody  understood  Dai's  wrath  then,  but  it  seems 
he  meant  to  arrange  the  plot  himself,  and  when  it 
was  ripe,  and  the  hour  nearly  come,  he  intended  to 
wager  that  he  could  break  the  quarantine,  and  to  take 
any  odds  he  could  get  that  he  would  free  the  entire 
party  in  half  an  hour.  As  for  the  plan  itself,  it  was 
idiotically  simple ;  we  were  perfectly  delighted  when 
we  heard  it.  It  was  so  simple  and  yet  so  compre 
hensive.  We  didn't  see  how  it  could  fail.  Both  the 
Mercer  girls  kissed  Dal  on  the  strength  of  it,  and 
Anne  was  furious.  Jim  was  not  so  much  pleased, 

231 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

for  some  reason  or  other,  and  Mr.  Harbison  looked 
thoughtful  rather  than  merry.  Aunt  Selina  had 
gone  to  bed. 

The  idea,  of  course,  was  to  start  an  embryo  fire 
just  inside  the  windows,  in  the  pans,  to  feed  it  with 
the  orange-fire  powder  that  is  used  on  the  Fourth  of 
July,  and  when  we  had  thrown  open  the  windows 
and  yelled  "fire"  and  all  the  guards  and  reporters  had 
rushed  to  the  front  of  the  house,  to  escape  quietly 
by  a  rear  door  from  the  basement  kitchen,  get  into 
machines  Dal  had  in  waiting,  and  lose  ourselves  as 
quickly  as  we  could. 

You  can  see  how  simple  it  was. 

We  were  terribly  excited,  of  course.  Every  one 
rushed  madly  for  motor  coats  and  veils,  and  Dal 
shuffled  the  numbers  so  the  people  going  the  same 
direction  would  have  the  same  machine.  We  called 
to  each  other  as  we  dressed  about  Mamaroneck  or 
Lakewood  or  wherever  we  happened  to  have  rela 
tives.  Everybody  knew  everybody  else,  and  his 
friends.  The  Mercer  girls  were  going  to  cruise 
until  the  trouble  blew  over,  the  Browns  were  going 

232 


ALMOST,    BUT    NOT    QUITE 

to  Pinehurst,  and  Jim  was  going  to  Africa  to  hunt, 
if  he  could  get  out  of  the  harbor. 

Only  the  Harbison  man  seemed  to  have  no  plans ; 
quite  suddenly  with  the  world  so  near  again,  the 
world  of  country  houses  and  steam  yachts  and  all 
the  rest  of  it,  he  ceased  to  be  one  of  us.  It  was  not 
his  world  at  all.  He  stood  back  and  watched  the 
kaleidoscope  of  our  coats  and  veils,  half-quizzically, 
but  with  something  in  his  face  that  I  had  not  seen 
there  before.  If  he  had  not  been  so  self-reliant  and 
big,  I  would  have  said  he  was  lonely.  Not  that  he 
was  pathetic  in  any  sense  of  the  word.  Of  course, 
he  avoided  me,  which  was  natural  and  exactly  what 
I  wished.  Bella  never  was  far  from  him  and  at  the 
last  she  loaded  him  with  her  jewel-case  and  a  muff 
and  'traveling-bag  and  asked  him  to  her  cousins'  on 
Long  Island.  I  felt  sure  he  was  going  to  decline, 
when  he  glanced  across  at  me. 

"Do  go,"  I  said,  very  politely.  "They  are  charm 
ing  people."  And  he  accepted  at  once ! 

It  was  a  transparent  plot  on  Bella's  part:  Two 
elderly  maiden  ladies,  house  miles  from  anywhere, 

233 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

long  evenings  in  the  music-room  with  an  open  fire 
and  Bella  at  the  harp  playing  the  two  songs  she 
knows. 

When  we  were  ready  and  gathered  in  the  kitchen, 
in  the  darkness,  of  course,  Dal  went  up  on  the  roof 
and  signaled  with  a  lantern  to  the  cars  on  the  drive 
Then  he  went  down-stairs,  took  a  last  look  at  the 
drawing-room,  fired  the  papers,  shook  on  the  pow 
der,  opened  the  windows  and  yelled  "fire!" 

Of  course,  huddled  in  the  kitchen  we  had  heard 
little  or  nothing.  But  we  plainly  heard  Dal  on  the 
first  floor  and  Flannigan  on  the  second  yelling 
"fire,"  and  the  patter  of  feet  as  the  guards  ran  to 
the  front  of  the  house.  And  at  that  instant  we  re 
membered  Aunt  Selina ! 

That  was  the  cause  of  the  whole  trouble.  I  don't 
know  why  they  turned  on  me :  she  wasn't  my  aunt. 
But  by  the  time  we  had  got  her  out  of  bed,  and  had 
wrapped  her  in  an  eiderdown  comfort,  and  stuck 
slippers  on  her  feet  and  a  motor  veil  on  her  head,  the 
glare  at  the  front  of  the  house  was  beginning  to  die 
away.  She  didn't  understand  at  all  and  we  had  no 

234 


ALMOST,    BUT    NOT    QUITE 

time  to  explain.  I  remember  that  she  wanted  to  go 
back  and  get  her  "plate,"  whatever  that  may  be,  but 
Jim  took  her  by  the  arm  and  hurried  her  along,  and 
the  rest,  who  had  waited,  and  were  in  awful  tempers, 
stood  aside  and  let  them  out  first. 

The  door  to  the  area  steps  was  open,  and  by  the 
street  lights  we  could  see  a  fence  and  a  gate,  which 
opened  on  a  side  street.  Jim  and  Aunt  Selina  ran 
straight  for  the  gate;  the  wind  blowing  Aunt  Se- 
lina's  comfort  like  a  sail.  Then,  with  our  feet,  so 
to  speak,  on  the  first  rungs  of  the  ladder  of  Liberty, 
it  slipped.  A  half-dozen  guards  and  reporters  came 
around  the  house  and  drove  us  back  like  sheep  into 
a  slaughter  pen.  It  was  the  most  humiliating  mo 
ment  of  my  life. 

Dal  had  been  for  fighting  a  way  through,  and  just 
for  a  minute  I  think  I  went  Berserk  myself.  But 
Max  spied  one  of  the  reporters  setting  up  a  flash 
light  as  we  stood,  undecided,  at  the  top  of  the  steps, 
and  after  that  there  was  nothing  to  do  but  retreat. 
We  backed  down  slowly,  to  show  them  we  were  not 
afraid.  And  when  we  were  all  in  the  kitchen  again, 

235 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

and  had  turned  on  the  lights  and  Bella  was  crying 
with  her  head  against  Mr.  Harbison's  arm,  Dal  said 
cheerfully, 

"Well,  it  has  done  some  good,  anyhow.  We 
have  lost  Aunt  Selina." 

And  we  all  shook  hands  on  it,  although  we  were 
sorry  about  Jim.  And  Dal  said  we  would  have 
some  champagne  and  drink  to  Aunt  Selina's  com 
fort,  and  we  could  have  her  teeth  fumigated  and 
send  them  to  her.  Somebody  said  "Poor  old  Jim," 
and  at  that  Bella  looked  up. 

She  stared  around  the  group,  and  then  she  went 
quite  pale. 

"Jim !"  she  gasped.  "Do  you  mean — that  Jim  is 
— out  there  too  ?" 

"Jim  and  Aunt  Selina!"  I  said  as  calmly  as  I 
could  for  joy.  You  can  see  how  it  simplified  the 
situation  for  me.  "By  this  time  they  are  a  mile 
away,  and  going!" 

Everybody  shook  hands  again  except  Bella.  She 
had  dropped  into  a  chair,  and  sat  biting  her  lip  and 
breathing  hard,  and  she  would  not  join  in  any  of 

236 


ALMOST,    BUT    NOT   QUITE 

the  hilarity  at  getting  rid  of  Aunt  Selina.  Finally 
she  got  up  and  knocked  over  her  chair. 

"You  are  a  lot  of  cowards,"  she  stormed.  "You 
deserted  them  out  there,  left  them.  Heaven  knows 
where  they  are — a  defenseless  old  woman,  and — and 
a  man  who  did  not  even  have  an  overcoat.  And  it 
is  snowing!" 

"Never  mind/'  Dal  said  reassuringly.  "He  can 
borrow  Aunt  Selina's  comfort.  Make  the  old  lady 
discard  from  weakness.  Anyhow,  Bella,  if  I  know 
anything  of  human  nature,  the  old  lady  will  make 
it  hot  enough  for  him.  Poor  old  Jim !" 

Then  they  shook  hands  again,  and  with  that  there 
came  a  terrible  banging  at  the  door,  which  we  had 
locked. 

"Open  the  door !"  some  one  commanded.  It  was 
one  of  the  guards. 

"Open  it  yourself!"  Dallas  called,  moving  a 
kitchen  table  to  reenforce  the  lock, 

"Open  that  door  or  we  will  break  it  in !" 

Dallas  put  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  seated  him 
self  on  the  table,  and  whistled  cheerfully.  We  could 

237 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

hear  them  conferring  outside,  and  they  made  an 
other  appeal  which  was  refused.  Suddenly  Bella 
came  over  and  confronted  Dallas. 

"They  have  brought  them  back!"  she  said  dra 
matically.  "They  are  out  there  now;  I  distinctly 
heard  Jim's  voice.  Open  that  door,  Dallas!" 

"Oh,  don't  let  them  in!"  I  wailed.  It  was  quite 
involuntary,  but  the  disappointment  was  too  awful. 
"Dallas,  don't  open  that  door!" 

Dal  swung  his  feet  and  smiled  from  Bella  to  me. 

"Think  what  a  solution  it  is  to  all  our  difficulties," 
he  said  easily.  "Without  Aunt  Selina  I  could  be 
happy  here  indefinitely." 

There  was  more  knocking,  and  somebody — Max, 
I  think — said  to  let  them  in,  that  it  was  a  fool  thing 
anyhow,  and  that  he  wanted  to  go  to  bed  and  forget 
it;  his  feet  were  cold.  And  just  then  there  was  a 
crash,  and  part  of  one  of  the  windows  fell  in.  The 
next  blow  from  outside  brought  the  rest  of  the  glass, 
and — somebody  was  coming  through,  feet  first.  It 
was  Jim. 

He  did  not  speak  to  any  of  us,  but  turned  and 

238 


ALMOST,   BUT   NOT   QUITE 

helped  in  a  bundle  of  red  and  yellow  silk  comfort 
that  proved  to  be  Aunt  Selina,  also  feet  first.  I  had 
a  glimpse  of  a  half-dozen  heads  outside,  guards  and 
reporters.  Then  Jim  jerked  the  shade  down  and 
unswathed  Aunt  Selina's  legs  so  that  she  could  walk, 
offered  his  arm,  and  stalked  past  us  and  up-stairs, 
without  a  word ! 

None  of  us  spoke.  We  turned  out  the  lights  and 
went  up-stairs  and  took  off  our  wraps  and  went  to 
bed.  It  had  been  almost  a  fiasco. 


239 


CHAPTER  XV 


SUSPICION   AND  DISCORD 

EVERY  one  was  nasty  the 
next  morning.  Aunt  Selina 
declared  that  her  feet 
were  frost  -  bitten  and 
kept  Bella  rubbing  them 
with  ice  water  all  morn 
ing.  And  Jim  was  im 
possible.  He  refused  to  speak 
to  any  of  us  and  he  watched 
Bella  furtively,  as  if  he  suspected  her  of  trying  to  get 
him  out  of  the  house. 

When  luncheon  time  came  around  and  he  had 
shown  no  indication  of  going  to  the  telephone  and 
ordering  it,  we  had  a  conclave,  and  Max  was  chosen 
to  remind  him  of  the  hour.  Jim  was  shut  in  the 
studio,  and  we  waited  together  in  the  hall  while 

240 


SUSPICION   AND   DISCORD 

Max  went  up.  When  he  came  down  he  was  some 
what  ruffled. 

"He  wouldn't  open  the  door/'  he  reported,  "and 
when  I  told  him  it  was  meal  time,  he  said  he  wasn't 
hungry,  and  he  didn't  give  a  whoop  about  the  rest 
of  us.  He  had  asked  us  here  to  dinner :  he  hadn't 
proposed  to  adopt  us." 

So  we  finally  ordered  luncheon  ourselves,  and 
about  two  o'clock  Jim  came  down-stairs,  sheepishly, 
and  ate  what  was  left.  Anne  declared  that  Bella 
had  been  scolding  him  in  the  upper  hall,  but  I 
doubted  it.  She  was  never  seen  to  speak  to  him 
unnecessarily. 

The  excitement  of  the  escape  over,  Mr.  Harbison 
and  I  remained  on  terms  of  armed  neutrality.  And 
Max  still  hunted  for  Anne's  pearls,  using  them,  the 
men  declared,  as  a  good  excuse  to  avoid  tinkering 
with  the  furnace  or  repairing  the  dumb-waiter, 
which  took  the  queerest  notions,  and  stopped  once, 
half-way  up  from  the  kitchen,  for  an  hour,  with  the 
dinner  on  it.  Anyhow,  Max  was  searching  the 
house  systematically,  armed  with  a  copy  of  Poe's 

241 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

Purloined  Letter  and  Gaboriau's  Monsieur  Lecoq. 
He  went  through  the  seats  of  the  chairs  with  hat 
pins,  tore  up  the  beds,  and  lifted  rugs,  until  the 
house  was  in  a  state  of  confusion.  And  the  next 
day,  the  fourth,  he  found  something — not  much,  but 
it  was  curious.  He  had  been  in  the  studio,  poking 
around  behind  the  dusty  pictures,  with  Jimmy  ex 
postulating  every  time  he  moved  anything  and  the 
rest  standing  around  watching  him. 

Max  was  strutting. 

"We  get  it  by  elimination,"  he  said  importantly. 
"The  pearls  being  nowhere  else  in  the  house,  they 
must  be  here  in  the  studio.  Three  parts  of  the 
studio  having  yielded  nothing,  they  must  be  in  the 
fourth.  Ladies  and  gentlemen,  let  me  have  your  at 
tention  for  one  moment.  I  tap  this  canvas  with  my 
wand — there  is  nothing  up  my  sleeve.  Then  I  pre 
pare  to  move  the  canvas — so.  And  I  put  my  hand 
in  the  pocket  of  this  disreputable  velvet  coat,  so. 
Behold!" 

Then  he  gave  a  low  exclamation  and  looked  at 
something  he  held  in  his  hand.  Every  one  stepped 

242 


I 

fe 

o 

e 

C/) 

3 

Q 

I 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

forward,  and  on  his  palm  was  the  small  diamond 
clasp  from  Anne's  collar ! 

Jimmy  was  apoplectic.  He  tried  to  smile,  but  no 
one  else  did. 

"Well,  I'll  be  flabbergasted !"  he  said.  "I  say,  you 
people,  you  don't  think  for  a  minute  that  I  put  that 
thing  there?  Why,  I  haven't  worn  that  coat  for  a 
month.  It's — it's  a  trick  of  yours,  Max." 

But  Max  shook  his  head ;  he  looked  stupefied,  and 
stood  gazing  from  the  clasp  to  the  pocket  of  the  old 
painting-coat.  Betty  dropped  on  a  folding  stool,  that 
promptly  collapsed  with  her  and  created  a  welcome 
diversion,  while  Anne  pounced  on  the  clasp  greedily, 
with  a  little  cry. 

"We  will  find  it  all  now,"  she  said  excitedly. 
"Did  you  look  in  the  other  pockets,  Max  ?" 

Then,  for  the  first  time,  I  was  conscious  of  an  air 
of  constraint  among  the  men.  Dallas  was  whistling 
softly,  and  Mr.  Harbison,  having  rescued  Betty,  was 
standing  silent  and  aloof,  watching  the  scene  with 
non-committal  eyes.  It  was  Max  who  spoke  first, 
after  a  hurried  inventory  of  the  other  pockets. 

244 


SUSPICION   AND    DISCORD 

"Nothing  else,"  he  said  constrainedly.  "I'll  move 
the  rest  of  the  canvases." 

But  Jim  interfered,  to  every  one's  surprise. 

"I  wouldn't,  if  I  were  you,  Max.  There's  noth 
ing  back  there.  I  had  'em  out  yesterday."  He  was 
quite  pale. 

"Nonsense!"  Max  said  gruffly.  "If  it's  a  prac 
tical  joke,  Jim,  why  don't  you  'fess  up?  Anne  has 
worried  enough." 

"The  pearls  are  not  there,  I  tell  you,"  Jim  began. 
Although  the  studio  was  cold,  there  were  little  fine 
beads  of  moisture  on  his  face.  "I  must  ask  you  not 
to  move  those  pictures."  And  then  Aunt  Selina 
came  to  the  rescue :  she  stalked  over  and  stood  with 
her  back  against  the  stack  of  canvases. 

"As  far  as  I  can  understand  this,"  she  declaimed, 
"you  gentlemen  are  trying  to  intimate  that  James 
knows  something  of  that  young  woman's  jewelry, 
because  you  found  part  of  it  in  his  pocket.  Cer 
tainly  you  will  not  move  the  pictures.  How  do  you 
know  that  the  young  gentleman  who  said  he  found 
it  there  didn't  have  it  up  his  sleeve  ?" 

245 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

She  looked  around  triumphantly,  and  Max  glow 
ered.  Dallas  soothed  her,  however. 

"Exactly  so,"  he  said.  "How  do  we  know  that 
Max  didn't  have  the  clasp  up  his  sleeve?  My  dear 
lady,  neither  my  wife  nor  I  care  anything  for  the 
pearls,  as  compared  with  the  priceless  pearl  of  peace. 
I  suggest  tea  on  the  roof;  those  in  favor — ?  My 
arm,  Miss  Caruthers." 

It  was  all  well  enough  for  Jim  to  say  later  that 
he  didn't  dare  to  have  the  canvases  moved,  for  he 
had  stuck  behind  them  all  sorts  of  chorus  girl  photo 
graphs  and  life-class  crayons  that  were  not  for 
Aunt  Selina's  eye,  besides  four  empty  siphons,  two 
full  ones,  and  three  bottles  of  whisky.  Not  a  soul 
believed  him :  there  was  a  new  element  of  suspicion 
and  discord  in  the  house. 

Every  one  went  up  on  the  roof  and  left  him  to  his 
mystery.  Anne  drank  her  tea  in  a  preoccupied  si 
lence,  with  half-closed  eyes,  an  attitude  that  boded 
ill  to  somebody.  The  rest  were  feverishly  gay,  and 
Aunt  Selina,  with  a  pair  of  arctics  on  her  feet  and 
a  hot-water  bottle  at  her  back,  sat  in  the  middle  of 

246 


SUSPICION    AND    DISCORD 

the  tent  and  told  me  familiar  anecdotes  of  Jimmy's 
early  youth  (had  he  known,  he  would  have  slain 
her).  Betty  and  Mr.  Harbison  had  found  a  medi 
cine  ball,  and  were  running  around  like  a  pair  of 
children.  It  was  quite  certain  that  neither  his 
escape  from  death  nor  my  accusation  weighed  heav 
ily  on  him. 

While  Aunt  Selina  was  busy  with  the  time  Jim 
had  swallowed  an  open  safety  pin,  and  just  as  the 
pin  had  been  coughed  up,  or  taken  out  of  his  nose — 
I  forget  which — Jim  himself  appeared  and  sulkily 
demanded  the  privacy  of  the  roof  for  his  training 
hour. 

Yes,  he  was  training.  Flannigan  claimed  to  know 
the  system  that  had  reduced  the  president  to  what  he 
is,  and  he  and  Jim  had  a  seance  every  day  which  left 
Jim  feeling  himself  for  bruises  all  evening.  He 
claimed  to  be  losing  flesh ;  he  said  he  could  actually 
feel  it  going,  and  he  and  Flannigan  had  spent  an  en 
tire  afternoon  in  the  cellar  three  days  before  with  a 
potato  barrel,  a  cane-seated  chair  and  a  lamp. 

The  whole  thing  had  been  shrouded  in  mystery. 
247 


WHEN  A  MAN  MARRIES 

They  sandpapered  the  inside  of  the  barrel  and  took 
out  all  the  nails,  and  when  they  had  finished  they  car 
ried  it  to  the  roof  and  put  it  in  a  corner  behind  the 
tent.  Everybody  was  curious,  but  Flannigan  refused 
any  information  about  it,  and  merely  said  it  was  part 
of  his  system.  Dal  said  that  if  he  had  anything  like 
that  in  his  system  he  certainly  would  be  glad  to  get 
rid  of  it. 

At  a  quarter  to  six  Jim  appeared,  still  sullen  from 
the  events  of  the  afternoon  and  wearing  a  dressing- 
gown  and  a  pair  of  slippers,  Flannigan  following 
him  with  a  sponge,  a  bucket  of  water  and  an  armful 
of  bath  towels.  Everybody  protested  at  having  to 
move,  but  he  was  firm,  and  they  all  filed  down  the 
stairs.  I  was  the  last,  with  Aunt  Selina  just  ahead  of 
me.  At  the  top  of  the  stairs  she  turned  around  sud 
denly  to  me. 

''That  policeman  looks  cruel/'  she  said.  "What's 
more,  he's  been  in  a  bad  humor  all  day.  More  than 
likely  he'll  put  James  flat  on  the  roof  and  tramp  on 
him,  under  pretense  of  training  him.  All  policemen 
are  inhuman." 

248 


SUSPICION    AND    DISCORD 

"He  only  rolls  him  over  a  barrel  or  something  like 
that,"  I  protested. 

"James  had  a  bump  like  an  egg  over  his  ear  last 
night/'  Aunt  Selina  insisted,  glaring  at  Flannigan's 
unconscious  back.  "I  don't  think  it's  safe  to  leave 
him.  It  is  my  time  to  relax  for  thirty  minutes,  or  I 
would  watch  him.  You  will  have  to  stay,"  she  said, 
fixing  me  with  her  imperious  eyes. 

So  I  stayed.  Jim  didn't  want  me,  and  Flannigan 
muttered  mutiny.  But  it  was  easier  to  obey  Aunt 
Selina  than  to  clash  with  her,  and  anyhow  I  wanted 
to  see  the  barrel  in  use. 

I  never  saw  any  one  train  before.  It  is  not  a  joy 
ful  spectacle.  First,  Flannigan  made  Jim  run, 
around  and  around  the  roof.  He  said  it  stirred  up 
his  food  and  brought  it  in  contact  with  his  liver,  to 
be  digested. 

Flannigan,  from  meekness  and  submission,  of  a 
sort,  in  the  kitchen,  became  an  autocrat  on  the  roof. 

"Once  more,"  he  would  say.  "Pick  up  your  feet, 
sir !  Pick  up  your  feet !" 

And  Jim  would  stagger  doggedly  past  me,  where 
249 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

I  sat  on  the  parapet,  his  poor  cheeks  shaking  and  the 
tail  of  his  bath-robe  wrapping  itself  around  his  legs. 
Yes,  he  ran  in  the  bath-robe  in  deference  to  me.  It 
seems  there  isn't  much  to  a  running  suit. 

"Head  up,"  Flannigan  would  say.  "Lift  your 
knees,  sir.  Didn't  you  ever  see  a  horse  with  string 
halt?" 

He  let  him  stop  finally,  and  gave  him  a  moment  to 
get  his  breath.  Then  he  set  him  to  turning  somer 
saults.  They  spread  the  cushions  from  the  couch  in 
the  tent  on  the  roof,  and  Jim  would  poke  his  head 
down  and  say  a  prayer,  and  then  curve  over  as  grace 
fully  as  a  sausage  and  come  up  gasping,  as  if  he  had 
been  pushed  off  a  boat. 

"Five  pounds  a  day;  not  less,  sir,"  Flannigan  said 
encouragingly.  "You'll  drop  it  in  chunks." 

Jim  looked  at  the  tin  as  if  he  expected  to  see  the 
chunks  lying  at  his  feet. 

"Yes,"  he  said,  wiping  the  back  of  his  neck.  "If 
we're  in  here  thirty  days  that  will  be  one  hundred 
and  fifty  pounds.  Don't  forget  to  stop  in  time,  Flan 
nigan.  I  don't  want  to  melt  away  like  a  candle." 

250 


SUSPICION   AND   DISCORD 

He  was  cheered,  however,  by  the  promise  of  re 
duction. 

"What  do  you  think  of  that,  Kit  ?"  he  called  to  me. 
"Your  uncle  is  going  to  look  as  angular  as  a  problem 
in  geometry.  I'll — I'll  be  the  original  reductlo  ad 
absurdum.  Do  you  want  me  to  stand  on  my 
head,  Flannigan?  Wouldn't  that  reduce  some 
thing?" 

"Your  brains,  sir,"  Flannigan  retorted  gravely, 
and  presented  a  pair  of  boxing-gloves.  Jim  visibly 
quailed,  but  he  put  them  on. 

"Do  you  know,  Flannigan,"  he  remarked,  as  he 
fastened  them,  "I'm  thinking  of  wearing  these  all 
the  time.  They  hide  my  character." 

Flannigan  looked  puzzled,  but  he  did  not  ask  an 
explanation.  He  demanded  that  Jim  shed  the  bath 
robe,  which  he  finally  did,  on  my  promise  to  watch 
the  sunset.  Then  for  fully  a  minute  there  was  no 
sound  save  of  feet  running  rapidly  around  the  roof, 
and  an  occasional  soft  thud.  Each  thud  was  accom 
panied  by  a  grunt  or  two  from  Jim.  Flannigan  was 
grimly  silent.  Once  there  was  a  smart  rap,  an  oath 

251 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

from  the  policeman,  and  a  mirthless  chuckle  from 
Jim.  The  chuckle  ended  in  a  crash,  however,  and  I 
turned.  Jim  was  lying  on  his  back  on  the  roof,  and 
Flannigan  was  wiping  his  ear  with  a  towel.  Jim  sat 
up  and  ran  his  hand  down  his  ribs. 

'They're  all  here,"  he  observed  after  a  minute.  "I 
thought  I  missed  one." 

"The  only  way  to  take  a  man's  weight  down," 
Flannigan  said  dryly. 

Jim  got  up  dizzily. 

"Down  on  the  roof,  I  suppose  you  mean,"  he  said. 

The  next  proceedings  were  mysterious.  Flannigan 
rolled  the  barrel  into  the  tent,  and  carried  in  a  small 
glass  lamp.  With  the  material  at  hand  he  seemed  to 
be  effecting  a  combination,  no  new  one,  to  judge  by 
his  facility.  Then  he  called  Jim. 

At  the  door  of  the  tent  Jim  turned  to  me,  his  bath 
robe  toga  fashion  around  his  shoulders. 

"This  is  a  very  essential  part  of  the  treatment," 
he  said  solemnly.  "The  exercise,  according  to  Flan 
nigan,  loosens  up  the  adipose  tissue.  The  next  step  is 
to  boil  it  out.  I  hope,  unless  your  instructions  com- 

252 


SUSPICION   AND   DISCORD 

i 

pel  you,  that  you  will  at  least  have  the  decency  to 
stay  out  of  the  tent." 

"I  am  going  at  once,"  I  said,  outraged.  "I'm  not 
here  because  Fm  mad  about  it,  and  you  know  it. 
And  don't  pose  with  that  bath-robe.  If  you  think 
you're  a  character  out  of  Roman  history,  look  at 
your  legs." 

"I  didn't  mean  to  offend  you,"  he  said  sulkily. 
"Only  I'm  tired  of  having  you  choked  down  my 
throat  every  time  I  open  my  mouth,  Kit.  And  don't 
go  just  yet.  Flannigan  is  going  for  my  clothes  as 
soon  as  he  lights  the — the  lamp ,  and — somebody 
ought  to  watch  the  stairs." 

That  was  all  there  was  to  it.  I  said  I  would  guard 
the  steps,  and  Flannigan,  having  ignited  the  combi 
nation,  whatever  it  was,  went  down-stairs.  How  was 
I  to  know  that  Bella  would  come  up  when  she  did  ? 
,Was  it  my  fault  that  the  lamp  got  too  high,  and  that 
Flannigan  couldn't  hear  Jim  calling?  or  that  just  as 
Bella  reached  the  top  of  the  steps  Jim  should  come  to 
the  door  of  the  tent,  wearing  the  barrel  part  of  his 
hot-air  cabinet,  and  yelling  for  a  doctor  ? 

253 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Bella  came  to  a  dead  stop  on  the  upper  step,  with 
her  mouth  open.  She  looked  at  Jim,  at  the  inade 
quate  barrel,  and  from  them  she  looked  at  me.  Then 
she  began  to  laugh,  one  of  her  hysterical  giggles,  and 
she  turned  and  went  down  again.  As  Jim  and  I 
stared  at  each  other  we  could  hear  her  gurgling 
down  the  hall  below. 

She  had  violent  hysterics  for  an  hour,  with  Anne 
rubbing  her  forehead  and  Aunt  Selina  burning  a 
feather  out  of  the  feather  duster  under  her  nose. 
Only  Jim  and  I  understood,  and  we  did  not  tell. 
Luckily,  the  next  thing  that  occurred  drove  Bella 
and  her  nerves  from  everybody's  mind. 

At  seven  o'clock,  when  Bella  had  dropped  asleep 
and  everybody  else  was  dressed  for  dinner,  Aunt  Se 
lina  discovered  that  the  house  was  cold,  and  ordered 
Dal  to  the  furnace. 

It  was  Dai's  day  at  the  furnace;  Flannigan  had 
been  relieved  of  that  part  of  the  work  after  twice  set 
ting  fire  to  a  chimney. 

In  five  minutes  Dal  came  back  and  spoke  a  few 
words  to  Max,  who  followed  him  to  the  basement, 

254 


SUSPICION   AND    DISCORD 

and  in  ten  minutes  more  Flannigan  puffed  up  the 
steps  and  called  Mr.  Harbison. 

I  am  not  curious,  but  I  knew  that  something  had 
happened.  While  Aunt  Selina  was  talking  suffrage 
to  Anne — who  said  she  had  always  been  tremen 
dously  interested  in  the  subject,  and  if  women  got  < 
the  suffrage  would  they  be  allowed  to  vote? — I 
slipped  back  to  the  dining-room. 

The  table  was  laid  for  dinner,  but  Flannigan  was 
not  in  sight.  I  could  hear  voices  from  somewhere, 
faint  voices  that  talked  rapidly,  and  after  a  while  I 
located  the  sounds  under  my  feet.  The  men  were  all 
in  the  basement,  and  something  must  have  happened. 
I  flew  back  to  the  basement  stairs,  to  meet  Mr.  Har 
bison  at  the  foot.  He  was  grimy  and  dusty,  with 
streaks  of  coal  dust  over  his  face,  and  he  had  been 
examining  his  revolver.  I  was  just  in  time  to  see 
him  slip  it  into  his  pocket. 

"What  is  the  matter  ?"  I  demanded.  "Is  any  one 
hurt?" 

"No  one,"  he  said  coolly.  "We've  been  cleaning 
out  the  furnace." 

255 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"With  a  revolver!  How  interesting — and  un 
usual!''  I  said  dryly,  and  slipped  past  him  as  he 
barred  the  way.  He  was  not  pleased ;  I  heard  him 
mutter  something  and  come  rapidly  after  me,  but  I 
had  the  voices  as  a  guide,  and  I  was  not  going  to  be 
turned  back  like  a  child.  The  men  had  gathered 
around  a  low  stone  arch  in  the  furnace-room,  and 
were  looking  down  a  short  flight  of  steps,  into  a  sort 
of  vault,  evidently  under  the  pavement.  A  faint 
light  came  from  a  small  grating  above,  and  there 
was  a  close,  musty  smell  in  the  air. 

"I  tell  you  it  must  have  been  last  night/'  Dallas 
was  saying.  "Wilson  and  I  were  here  before  we 
went  to  bed,  and  I'll  swear  that  hole  was  not  there 
then." 

"It  was  not  there  this  morning,  sir,"  Flannigan 
insisted.  "It  has  been  made  during  the  day." 

"And  it  could  not  have  been  done  this  afternoon," 
Mr.  Harbison  said  quietly.  "I  was  fussing  with  the 
telephone  wire  down  here.  I  would  have  heard  the 


noise." 


256 


SUSPICION   AND    DISCORD 

Something  in  his  voice  made  me  look  at  him,  and 
certainly  his  expression  was  unusual.  He  was 
watching  us  all  intently  while  Dallas  pointed  out  to 
me  the  cause  of  the  excitement.  From  the  main 
floor  .of  the  furnace-room,  a  flight  of  stone  steps 
surmounted  by  an  arch  led  into  the  coal  cellar,  be 
neath  the  street.  The  coal  cellar  was  of  brick,  with 
a  cement  floor,  and  in  the  left  wall  there  gaped  an 
opening  about  three  feet  by  three,  leading  into  a  cav 
ernous  void,  perfectly  black — evidently  a  similar 
vault  belonging  to  the  next  house. 

The  whole  place  was  ghostly,  full  of  shadows, 
shivery  with  possibilities.  It  was  Mr.  Harbison 
finally  who  took  Jim's  candle  and  crawled  through 
the  aperture.  We  waited  in  dead  silence,  listening 
to  his  feet  crunching  over  the  coal  beyond,  watching 
the  faint  yellow  light  that  came  through  the  ragged 
opening  in  the  wall.  Then  he  came  back  and  called 
through  to  us. 

"Place  is  locked,  over  here/'  he  said.  "Heavy 
oak  door  at  the  head  of  the  steps.  Whoever  made 

257 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

that  opening  has  done  a  prodigious  amount  of  labor 
for  nothing." 

The  weapon,  a  crowbar,  lay  on  the  ground  beside 
the  bricks,  and  he  picked  it  up  and  balanced  it  on  his 
hand.  Dallas'  florid  face  was  almost  comical  in  his 
bewilderment;  as  for  Jimmy — he  slammed  a  piece 
of  slag  at  the  furnace  and  walked  away.  At  the 
door  he  turned  around. 

"Why  don't  you  accuse  me  of  it?"  he  asked  bit 
terly.  "Maybe  you  could  find  a  lump  of  coal  in  my 
pockets  if  you  searched  me." 

He  stalked  up  the  stairs  then  and  left  us.  Dallas 
and  I  went  up  together,  but  we  did  not  talk.  There 
seemed  to  be  nothing  to  say.  Not  until  I  had  closed 
and  locked  the  door  of  my  room  did  I  venture  to 
look  at  something  that  I  carried  in  the  palm  of  my 
hand.  It  was  a  watch,  not  running — a  gentleman's 
flat  gold  watch,  and  it  had  been  hanging  by  its  fob 
to  a  nail  in  the  bricks  beside  the  aperture. 

In  the  back  of  the  watch  were  the  initials  T.  H.  H. 
and  the  picture  of  a  girl,  cut  from  a  newspaper. 

It  was  my  picture. 

258 


CHAPTER    XVI 


I   FACE   FLANNIGAN 

DINNER  waited  that  night  while 
everybody  went  to  the  coal  cel 
lar  and  stared  at  the  hole  in  the 
wall,  and  watched  while  Max 
took  a  tracing  of  it  and  of  some 
footprints  in  the  coal  dust  on 
the  other  side. 

I  did  not  go.  I  went  into  the 
library  with  the  guilty  watch  in  a 
fold  of  my  gown,  and  found  Mr.  Harbison  there, 
staring  through  the  February  gloom  at  the  blank 
wall  of  the  next  house,  and  quite  unconscious  of  the 
reporter  with  a  drawing  pad  just  below  him  in  the 
area-way.  I  went  over  and  closed  the  shutters  be 
fore  his  very  eyes,  but  even  then  he  did  not  move. 

"Will  you  be  good  enough  to  turn  around?"  I 
demanded  at  last, 

259 


i  WAS  CRYING;  I  ALWAYS  DO  WHEN  i  AM  ANGRY 


I    FACE    FLANNIGAN 

"Oh!"  he  said  wheeling.    "Are  you  here?" 

There  wasn't  any  reply  to  that,  so  I  took  the 
watch  and  placed  it  on  the  library  table  between  us. 
The  effect  was  all  that  I  had  hoped.  He  stared  at  it 
for  an  instant,  then  at  me,  and  with  his  hand  out 
stretched  for  it,  stopped. 

"Where  did  you  find  it?"  he  asked.  I  couldn't 
understand  his  expression.  He  looked  embarrassed, 
but  not  at  all  afraid. 

"I  think  you  know,  Mr.  Harbison,"  I  retorted. 

"I  wish  I  did.    You  opened  it?" 

"Yes." 

We  stood  looking  at  each  other  across  the  table. 
It  was  his  glance  that  wavered. 

"About  the  picture — of  you,"  he  said  at  last. 
"You  see,  down  there  in  South  America,  a  fellow 
hasn't  much  to  do  in  the  evenings,  and  a — a  chum  of 
mine  and  I — we  were  awfully  down  on  what  we 
called  the  plutocrats,  the — the  leisure  classes.  And 
when  that  picture  of  yours  came  in  the  paper,  we 
had — we  had  an  argument.  He  said — "  He 
stopped. 

261 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"What  did  he  say?" 

"Well,  he  said  it  was  the  picture  of  an  empty- 
faced  society  girl." 

"Oh !"  I  exclaimed. 

"I — I  maintained  there  were  possibilities  in  the 
face."  He  put  both  hands  on  the  table,  and,  bend 
ing  forward,  looked  down  at  me.  "Well,  I  was  a 
fool,  I  admit.  I  said  your  eyes  were  kind  and  can 
did,  in  spite  of  that  haughty  mouth.  You  see,  I 
said  I  was  a  fool." 

"I  think  you  are  exceedingly  rude,"  I  managed 
finally.  "If  you  want  to  know  where  I  found  your 
watch,  it  was  down  in  the  coal  cellar.  And  if  you 
admit  you  are  an  idiot,  I  am  not.  I — I  know  all 
about  Bella's  bracelet — and  the  board  on  the  roof, 
and — oh,  if  you  would  only  leave — Anne's  necklace 
— on  the  coal,  or  somewhere — and  get  away — " 

My  voice  got  beyond  me  then,  and  I  dropped  into 
a  chair  and  covered  my  face.  I  could  feel  him  star 
ing  at  the  back  of  my  head. 

"Well,  I'll  be — "  something  or  other,  he  said  final 
ly,  and  then  he  turned  on  his  heel  and  went  out. 

262 


I    FACE    FLANNIGAN 

By  the  time  I  got  my  eyes;dry  (yes,  I  was  cry 
ing;  I  always  do  when  I  am  angry)  I  heard  Jim 
coming  down-stairs,  and  I  tucked  the  watch  out  of 
sight.  Would  any  one  have  foreseen  the  trouble 
that  watch  would  make  I 

Jim  was  sulky.  He  dropped  into  a  chair  and 
stretched  out  his  legs,  looking  gloomily  at  nothing. 
Then  he  got  up  and  ambled  into  his  den,  closing  the 
door  behind  him  without  having  spoken  a  word.  It 
was  more  than  human  nature  could  stand. 

When  I  went  into  the  den  he  was  stretched  on 
the  davenport  with  his  face  buried  in  the  cushions. 
He  looked  absolutely  wilted,  and  every  line  of  him 
was  drooping. 

"Go  on  out,  Kit,"  he  said,  in  a  smothered  voice. 
"B£  a  good  girl  and  don't  follow  me  around." 

"You  are  shameless!"  I  gasped.  "Follow  you! 
When  you  are  hung  around  my  neck  like  a — like 
a — "  Millstone  was  what  I  wanted  to  say,  but  I 
couldn't  think  of  it. 

He  turned  over  and  looked  up  from  his  cushions 
like  an  ill-treated  and  suffering  cherub. 

263 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"I'm  done  for,  Kit,"  he  groaned.  "Bella  wen4  up 
to  the  studio  after  we  left,  and  investigated  that 
corner." 

"What  did  she  find?  The  necklace?'  T  asked 
eagerly.  He  was  too  wretched  to  notice  this. 

"No,  that  picture  of  you  that  I  did  last  winter. 
She  is  crazy — she  says  she  is  going  up-stairs  and  sit 
in  Takahiro's  room  and  take  smallpox  and  die." 

"Fiddlesticks !"  I  said  rudely,  and  somebody  ham 
mered  on  the  door  and  opened  it. 

"Pardon  me  for  disturbing  you,"  Bella  said,  in 
her  best  dear-me-I'm-glad-I-knocked  manner.  "But 
— Flannigan  says  the  dinner  has  not  come." 

"Good  Lord !"  Jim  exclaimed.  "I  forgot  to  order 
the  confounded  dinner !" 

It  was  eight  o'clock  by  that  time,  and  as  it  took 
an  hour  at  least  after  telephoning  the  order,  every 
body  looked  blank  when  they  heard.  The  entire 
family,  except  Mr.  Harbison,  who  had  not  appeared 
again,  escorted  Jim  to  the  telephone  and  hung 
around  hungrily,  suggesting  new  dishes  every  min 
ute.  And  then — he  couldn't  raise  Central.  It  was 

264 


I    FACE    FLANNIGAN 

fifteen  minutes  before  we  gave  up,  and  stood  staring 
at  one  another  despairingly. 

"Call  out  of  a  window,  and  get  one  of  those  infer 
nal  reporters  to  do  something  useful  for  once,"  Max 
suggested.  But  he  was  indignantly  hushed.  We 
would  have  starved  first.  Jim  was  peering  into  the 
transmitter  and  knocking  the  receiver  against  his 
hand,  like  a  watch  that  had  stopped.  But  nothing 
happened.  Flannigan  reported  a  box  of  breakfast 
food,  two  lemons,  and  a  pineapple  cheese,  a  com 
bination  that  didn't  seem  to  lend  itself  to  anything. 

We  went  back  to  the  dining-room  from  sheer 
force  of  habit  and  sat  around  the  table  and  looked 
at  the  lemonade  Flannigan  had  made.  Anne  would 
talk  about  the  salad  her  last  cook  had  concocted,  and 
Max  told  about  a  little  town  in  Connecticut  where 
the  restaurant  keeper  smokes  a  corn-cob  pipe  while 
he  cooks  the  most  luscious  fried  clams  in  America. 
And  Aunt  Selina  related  that  in  her  family  they  had 
a  recipe  for  chicken  smothered  in  cream.  And  then 
we  sipped  the  weak  lemonade  and  nibbled  at  the 
cheese. 

265 


YOU    ARE    HUNG  ROUNP   MY    NECK   LIKE   A    MILLSTONE 


1   FACE   FLANNIGAN 

"To  change  this  gridiron  martyrdom/'  Dallas 
said  finally,  "where's  Harbison?  Still  looking  for 
his  watch  ?" 

"Watch!"    Everybody  said  it  in  a  different  tone. 

"Sure/'  he  responded.  "Says  his  watch  was 
taken  last  night  from  the  studio.  Better  get  him 
down  to  take  a  squint  at  the  telephone.  Likely  he 
can  fix  it." 

Flannigan  was  beside  me  with  the  cheese.  And 
at  that  moment  I  felt  Mr.  Harbison's  stolen  watch 
slip  out  of  my  girdle,  slide  greasily  across  my  lap, 
and  clatter  to  the  floor.  Flannigan  stooped,  but 
luckily  it  had  gone  under  the  table.  To  have  had  it 
picked  up,  to  have  had  to  explain  how  I  got  it,  to  see 
them  try  to  ignore  my  picture  pasted  in  it — oh,  it 
was  impossible !  I  put  my  foot  over  it. 

"Drop  something?"  Dallas  asked  perfunctorily, 
rising.  Flannigan  was  still  half  kneeling. 

"A  fork,"  I  said,  as  easily  as  I  could,  and  the  con 
versation  went  on.  But  Flannigan  knew,  and  I 
knew  he  knew.  He  watched  my  every  movement 
like  a  hawk  after  that,  standing  just  behind  my 

267 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

chair.  I  dropped  my  useless  napkin,  to  have  it 
whirled  up  before  it  reached  the  floor.  I  said  to 
Betty  that  my  shoe  buckle  was  loose,  and  actually 
got  the  watch  in  my  hand,  only  to  let  it  slip  at  the 
critical  moment.  Then  they  all  got  up  and  went 
sadly  back  to  the  library,  and  Flannigan  and  I  faced 
each  other. 

Flannigan  was  not  a  handsome  man  at  any  time, 
though  up  to  then  he  had  at  least  looked  amiable. 
But  now  as  I  stood  with  my  hand  on  the  back  of  my 
chair,  his  face  grew  suddenly  menacing.  The  silence 
was  absolute:  I  was  the  guiltiest  wretch  alive,  and 
opposite  me  the  law  towered  and  glowered,  and  held 
the  yellow  remnant  of  a  pineapple  cheese!  And  in 
the  silence  that  wretched  watch  lay  and  ticked  and 
ticked  and  ticked.  Then  Flannigan  creaked  over  and 
closed  the  door  into  the  hall,  came  back,  picked  up 
the  watch,  and  looked  at  it. 

"You're  unlucky,  I'm  thinking"  he  said  finally. 
"You've  got  the  nerve  all  right,  but  you  ain't  cute 
enough." 

"I  don't  know  what  you  mean,"  I  quavered. 
268 


I    FACE    FLANNIGAN 

"Give  me  that  watch  to  return  to  Mr.  Harbison." 

"Not  on  your  life,"  he  retorted  easily.  "I  give  it 
back  myself,  like  I  did  the  bracelet,  and — like  I'm 
going  to  give  back  the  necklace,  if  you'll  act  like  a 
sensible  little  girl." 

I  could  only  choke. 

"It's  foolish,  any  way  you  look  at  it,"  he  persisted. 
"Here  you  are,  lots  of  friends,  folks  that  think 
you're  all  right.  Why,  I  reckon  there  isn't  one  of 
them  that  wouldn't  lend  you  money  if  you  needed  it 
so  bad." 

"Will  you  be  still?"  I  said  furiously.  "Mr.  Har 
bison  left  that  watch — with  me — an  hour  ago.  Get 
him,  and  he  will  tell  you  so  himself!" 

"Of  course  he  would,"  Flannigan  conceded,  look 
ing  at  me  with  grudging  approval.  "He  wouldn't 
be  what  I  think  he  is,  if  he  didn't  lie  up  and  down  for 
you."  There  were  voices  in  the  hall.  Flannigan  came 
closer.  "An  hour  ago,  you  say.  And  he  told  me  it 
was  gone  this  morning!  It's  a  losing  game,  miss. 
I'll  give  you  twenty-four  hours  and  then — the  neck 
lace,  if  you  please,  miss." 

269 


CHAPTER    XVII 

A    CLASH    AND   A    KISS 

THE  clash  that  came  that  even 
ing  had  been  threatening  for 
some  time.  Take  an  immovable 
body,  represented  by  Mr.  Har 
bison  and  his  square  jaw,  and 
an  irresistible  force,  Jimmy  and 
his  weight,  and  there  is  bound 
to  be  trouble. 

The  real  fault  was  Jim's.  He  had 
gone  entirely  mad  again  over  Bella,  and  thrown  pru 
dence  to  the  winds.  He  mooned  at  her  across  the 
dinner-table,  and  waylaid  her  on  the  stairs  or  in  the 
back  halls,  just  to  hear  her  voice  when  she  ordered 
him  out  of  the  way.  He  telephoned  for  flowers  and 
candy  for  her  quite  shamelessly,  and  he  got  out  a 
book  of  photographs  that  they  had  taken  on  their 

270 


A   CLASH   AND   A    KISS 

wedding-journey,  and  kept  it  on  the  library  table. 
The  sole  concession  he  made  to  our  presumptive  re 
lationship  was  to  bring  me  the  responsibility  for 
everything  that  went  wrong,  and  his  shirts  for  but 
tons. 

The  first  I  heard  of  the  trouble  was  from  Dal. 
He  waylaid  me  in  the  hall  after  dinner  that  night, 
and  his  face  was  serious. 

'Tm  afraid  we  can't  keep  it  up  very  long,  Kit," 
he  said.  "With  Jim  trailing  Bella  all  over  the 
house,  and  the  old  lady  keener  every  day,  it's  bound 
to  come  out  somehow.  And  that  isn't  all.  Jim  and 
Harbison  had  a  set-to  to-day — about  you." 

"About  me !"  I  repeated.  "Oh,  I  dare  say  I  have 
been  falling  short  again.  What  was  Jim  doing? 
Abusing  me  ?" 

Dal  looked  cautiously  over  his  shoulder,  but  no 
one  was  near. 

"It  seems  that  the  gentle  Bella  has  been  unusually 
beastly  to-day  to  Jim,  and — I  believe  she's  jealous 
of  you,  Kit.  Jim  followed  her  up  to  the  roof  before 
dinner  with  a  box  of  flowers,  and  she  tossed  them 

271 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

over  the  parapet.  She  said,  I  believe,  that  she  didn't 
want  his  flowers :  he  could  buy  them  for  you,  and  be 
damned  to  him,  or  some  lady-like  equivalent." 

"Jim  is  a  jellyfish/'  I  said  contemptuously. 
"What  did  he  say?" 

"He  said  he  only  cared  for  one  woman,  and  that 
was  Bella:  that  he  never  had  really  cared  for  you 
and  never  would,  and  that  divorce  courts  were  not 
unmitigated  evils  if  they  showed  people  the  way  to 
real  happiness.  Which  wouldn't  amount  to  any 
thing  if  Harbison  had  not  been  in  the  tent,  trying  to 
sleep!" 

Dal  did  not  know  all  the  particulars,  but  it  seems 
that  relations  between  Jim  and  Mr.  Harbison  were 
rather  strained.  Bella  had  left  the  roof  and  Jim 
and  the  Harbison  man  came  face  to  face  in  the  door 
of  the  tent.  According  to  Dal,  little  had  been  said, 
but  Jim,  bound  by  his  promise  to  me,  could  not  ex 
plain,  and  could  only  stammer  something  about  be 
ing  an  old  friend  of  Miss  Knowles.  And  Tom  had 
replied  shortly  that  it  was  none  of  his  business,  but 
that  there  were  some  things  friendship  hardly 

272 


A    CLASH    AND   A    KISS 

justified,  and  tried  to  pass  Jinx  Jim  was  instantly 
enraged :  he  blocked  the  door  to  the  roof  and  de 
manded  to  know  what  the  other  man  meant.  There 
were  two  or  three  versions  of  the  answer  he  got. 
The  general  purport  was  that  Mr.  Harbison  had  no 
desire  to  explain  further,  and  that  the  situation  was 
forced  on  him.  But  if  he  insisted — when  a  man 
systematically  ignored  and  neglected  his  wife  for 
some  one  else,  there  were  communities  where  he 
would  be  tarred  and  feathered. 

"Meaning  me?"  Jim  demanded,  apoplectic. 

"The  remark  was  a  general  one,"  Mr.  Harbison 
retorted,  "but  if  you  wish  to  make  a  concrete  appli 
cation—  !" 

Dal  had  gone  up  just  then,  and  found  them  glar 
ing  at  each  other,  Jim  with  his  hands  clenched  at  his 
sides,  and  Mr.  Harbison  with  his  arms  folded  and 
very  erect.  Dal  took  Jim  by  the  elbow  and  led  him 
down-stairs,  muttering,  and  the  situation  was  saved 
for  the  time.  But  Dal  was  not  optimistic. 

"You  can  do  a  bit  yourself,  Kit "  he  finished. 
"Look  more  cheerful,  flirt  a  little.  You  can  do  that 

273 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

without  trying.  Take  Max  on  for  a  day  or  so:  it 
would  be  chanty  anyhow.  But  don't  let  Tom  Har 
bison  take  it  into  his  head  that  you  are  grieving 
over  Jim's  neglect,  or  he's  likely  to  toss  him  off  the 
roof." 

"I  have  no  reason  to  think  that  Mr.  Harbison 
cares  one  way  or  the  other  about  me,"  I  said  primly. 
"You  don't  think  he's — he's  in  love  with  me,  do 
you,  Dal  ?"  I  watched  him  out  of  the  corner  of  my 
eye,  but  he  only  looked  amused. 

"In  love  with  you!"  he  repeated.  "Why  bless 
your  wicked  little  heart,  no!  He  thinks  you're  a 
married  woman !  It's  the  principle  of  the  thing  he's 
fighting  for.  If  I  had  as  much  principle  as  he  has, 
I'd— I'd  put  it  out  at  interest." 

Max  interrupted  us  just  then,  and  asked  if  we 
knew  where  Mr.  Harbison  was. 

"Can't  find  him,"  he  said.  "I've  got  the  telephone 
together  and  have  enough  left  over  to  make  another. 
Where  do  you  suppose  Harbison  hides  the  tools? 
I'm  working  with  a  corkscrew  and  two  palette 
knives." 

274 


A   CLASH    AND   A    KISS 

I  heard  nothing  more  of  the  trouble  that  night. 
Max  went  to  Jim  about  it,  and  Jim  said  angrily  that 
only  a  fool  would  interfere  between  a  man  and  his 
wife — wives.  Whereupon  Max  retorted  that  a  fool 
and  his  wives  were  soon  parted,  and  left  him.  The 
two  principals  were  coldly  civil  to  each  other,  and 
smaller  issues  were  lost  as  the  famine  grew  more 
and  more  insistent.  For  famine  it  was. 

They  worked  the  rest  of  the  evening,  but  the  tele 
phone  refused  to  revive  and  every  one  was  starving. 
Individually  our  pride  was  at  low  ebb,  but  col 
lectively  it  was  still  formidable.  So  we  sat  around 
and  Jim  played  Grieg  with  the  soft  stops  on,  and 
Aunt  Selina  went  to  bed.  The  weather  had  changed, 
and  it  was  sleeting,  but  anything  was  better  than  the 
drawing-room.  I  was  in  a  mood  to  battle  with  the 
elements  or  to  cry — or  both — so  I  slipped  out,  while 
Dal  was  reciting  "Give  me  three  grains  of  corn, 
mother,"  threw  somebody's  overcoat  over  my  shoul 
ders,  put  on  a  man's  soft  hat — Jim's  I  think — and 
went  up  to  the  roof. 

It  was  dark  in  the  third  floor  hall,  and  I  had  to 

275 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

feel  my  way  to  the  foot  of  the  stairs.  I  went  up  quiet 
ly,  and  turned  the  knob  of  the  door  to  the  roof.  At 
first  it  would  not  open,  and  I  could  hear  the  wind 
howling  outside.  Finally,  however,  I  got  the  door 
open  a  little  and  wormed  my  way  through.  It  was 
not  entirely  dark  out  there,  in  spite  of  the  storm.  A 
faint  reflection  of  the  street  lights  made  it  possible 
to  distinguish  the  outlines  of  the  boxwood  plants, 
swaying  in  the  wind,  and  the  chimneys  and  the  tent. 
And  then — a  dark  figure  disentangled  itself  from 
the  nearest  chimney  and  seemed  to  hurl  itself  at  me. 
I  remember  putting  out  my  hands  and  trying  to  say 
something,  but  the  figure  caught  me  roughly  by  the 
shoulders  and  knocked  me  back  against  the  door 
frame.  From  miles  away  a  heavy  voice  was  say 
ing,  "So  I've  got  you!"  and  then  the  roof  gave 
from  under  me,  and  I  was  floating  out  on  the  storm, 
and  sleet  was  beating  in  my  face,  and  the  wind  was 
whispering  over  and  over,  "Open  your  eyes,  for 
God's  sake!" 

I  did  open  them  after  a  while,  and  finally  I  made 
out  that  I  was  lying  on  the  floor  in  the  tent.    The 

276 


A   CLASH   AND   A   KISS 

lights  were  on,  and  I  had  a  cold  and  damp  feeling, 
and  something  wet  was  trickling  down  my  neck. 

I  seemed  to  be  alone,  but  in  a  second  somebody 
came  into  the  tent,  and  I  saw  it  was  Mr.  Harbison, 
and  that  he  had  a  double  handful  of  half  melted 
snow.  He  looked  frantic  and  determined,  and  only 
my  sitting  up  quickly  prevented  my  getting  another 
snow  bath.  My  neck  felt  queer  and  stiff,  and  I  was 
very  dizzy.  When  he  saw  that  I  was  conscious  he 
dropped  the  snow  and  stood  looking  down  at  me. 

"Do  you  know,"  he  said  grimly,  "that  I  very  near 
ly  choked  you  to  death  a  little  while  ago  ?" 

"It  wouldn't  surprise  me  to  be  told  so,"  I  said. 
"Do  I  know  too  much,  or  what  is  it,  Mr.  Harbi 
son  ?"  I  felt  terribly  ill,  but  I  would  not  let  him  see 
it.  "It  is  queer,  isn't  it — how  we  always  select  the 
roof  for  our  little — differences?"  He  seemed  to 
relax  somewhat  at  my  gibe. 

"I  didn't  know  it  was  you,"  he  explained  shortly. 
"I  was  waiting  for — some  one,  and  in  the  hat  you 
wore,  and  the  coat,  I  mistook  you.  That's  all.  Can 
you  stand  ?" 

277 


ONLY  SITTING   UP   QUICKLY  PREVENTED   ANOTHER  SNOW   BATH 


A   CLASH    AND   A   KISS 

"No,"  I  retorted.  I  could,  but  his  summary  man 
ner  displeased  me.  The  sequel,  however,  was  rather 
amazing,  for  he  stooped  suddenly  and  picked  me  up, 
and  the  next  instant  we  were  out  in  the  storm  to 
gether.  At  the  door  he  stooped  and  felt  for  the  knob, 

"Turn  it,"  he  commanded.    "I  can't  reach  it." 

"I'll  do  nothing  of  the  kind,"  I  said  shrewishly. 
"Let  me  down ;  I  can  walk  perfectly  well." 

He  hesitated.  Then  he  slid  me  slowly  to  my  feet, 
but  he  did  not  open  the  door  at  once.  "Are  you 
afraid  to  let  me  carry  you  down  those  stairs,  after 
— Tuesday  night?"  he  asked,  very  low.  "You  still 
think  I  did  that?" 

I  had  never  been  less  sure  of  it  than  at  that  mo 
ment,  but  an  imp  of  perversity  made  me  retort, 
"Yes." 

He  hardly  seemed  to  hear  me.  He  stood  looking 
down  at  me  as  I  leaned  against  the  door-frame. 

"Good  Lord!"  he  groaned.  "To  think  that  I 
might  have  killed  you !"  And  then — he  stooped  and 
suddenly  kissed  me. 

The  next  moment  the  door  was  open,  and  he  was 
279 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

leading  me  down  into  the  house.  At  the  foot  of  the 
staircase  he  paused,  still  holding  my  hand,  and  faced 
me  in  the  darkness. 

"I'm  not  sorry,"  he  said  steadily.  "I  suppose  I 
ought  to  be,  but  I'm  not.  Only — I  want  you  to 
know  that  I  was  not  guilty — before.  I  didn't  intend 
to  now.  I  am — almost  as  much  surprised  as  you 
are." 

I  was  quite  unable  to  speak,  but  I  wrenched  my 
hand  loose.  He  stepped  back  to  let  me  pass,  and  I 
went  down  the  hall  alone. 


280 


CHAPTER    XVIII 

IT'S   ALL   MY    FAULT 

^  I  DIDN'T  go  to  the  drawing-room 
again.  I  went  into  my  own  room 
and  sat  in  the  dark,  and  tried  to  be 
furiously  angry,  and  only  suc 
ceeded  in  feeling  queer  and  tingly.  One 
thing  was  absolutely  certain :  not  the  same  man,  but 
two  different  men  had  kissed  me  on  the  stairs  to  the 
roof.  It  sounds  rather  horrid  and  discriminating, 
but  there  was  all  the  difference  in  the  world. 

But  then — who  had?  And  for  whom  had  Mr. 
Harbison  been  waiting  on  the  roof  ?  "Did  you  know 
that  I  nearly  choked  you  to  death  a  few  minutes 
ago  ?"  Then  he  rather  expected  to  finish  somebody 
in  that  way !  Who  ?  Jim,  probably.  It  was  strange, 
too,  but  suddenly  I  realized  that  no  matter  how 
many  suspicious  things  I  mustered  up  against  him 

281 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES        3 

— and  there  were  plenty — down  in  my  heart  I  didn't 
believe  him  guilty  of  anything,  except  this  last  and 
unforgivable  offense.  Whoever  was  trying  to  leave 
the  house  had  taken  the  necklace,  that  seemed  clear, 
unless  Max  was  still  foolishly  trying  to  break  quar 
antine  and  create  one  of  the  sensations  he  so  dearly 
loves.  This  was  a  new  idea,  and  some  things  up 
held  it,  but  Max  had  been  playing  bridge  when  I  was 
kissed  on  the  stairs,  and  there  was  still  left  that  ridic 
ulous  incident  of  the  comfort. 

Bella  came  up  after  I  had  gone  to  bed,  and  turned 
on  the  light  to  brush  her  hair. 

"If  I  don't  leave  this  mausoleum  soon,  I'll  be  car 
ried  out,"  she  declared.  "You  in  bed,  Lollie  Mercer 
and  Dal  flirting,  Anne  hysterical,  and  Jim  making 
his  will  in  the  den!  You  will  have  to  take  Aunt 
Selina  to-night,  Kit;  I'm  all  in." 

"If  you'll  put  her  to  bed,  I'll  keep  her  there,"  I 
conceded,  after  some  parley. 

"You're  a  dear."  Bella  came  back  from  the  door. 
"Look  here,  Kit,  you  know  Jim  pretty  well.  Don't 
you  think  he  looks  ill?  Thinner?" 

282 


IT'S   ALL    MY    FAULT 

"He's  a  wreck,"  I  said  soberly.  "You  have  a  lot 
to  answer  for,  Bella." 

Bella  went  over  to  the  cheval  glass  and  looked  in 
it.  "I  avoid  him  all  I  can,"  she  said,  posing.  "He's 
awfully  funny;  he's  so  afraid  I'll  think  he's  serious 
about  you.  He  can't  realize  that  for  me  he  simply 
doesn't  exist." 

Well,  I  took  Aunt  Selina,  and  about  two  o'clock, 
while  I  was  in  my  first  sleep,  I  woke  to  find  her 
standing  beside  me,  tugging  at  my  arm. 

"There's  somebody  in  the  house/'  she  whispered. 
"Thieves!" 

"If  they're  in  they'll  not  get  out  to-night,"  I  said. 

"I  tell  you,  I  saw  a  man  skulking  on  the  stairs/' 
she  insisted. 

I  got  up  ungraciously  enough,  and  put  on  my 
dressing-gown.  Aunt  Selina,  who  had  her  hair  in 
crimps,  tied  a  veil  over  her  head,  and  together  we 
went  to  the  head  of  the  stairs.  Aunt  Selina  leaned 
far  over  and  peered  down. 

"He's  in  the  library,"  she  whispered.  "I  can  see 
a  light." 

283 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

The  lust  of  battle  was  in  Aunt  Selina's  eye.  She 
girded  her  robe  about  her  and  began  to  descend  the 
stairs  cautiously.  We  went  through  the  hall  and 
stopped  at  the  library  door.  It  was  empty,  but  from 
the  den  beyond  came  a  hum  of  voices  and  the  cheer 
ful  glow  of  fire-light.  I  realized  the  situation  then, 
but  it  was  too  late. 

"Then  why  did  you  kiss  her  in  the  dining-room  ?" 
Bella  was  saying  in  her  clear,  high  tones.  "You  did, 
didn't  you  ?" 

"It  was  only  her  hand,"  Jim,  desperately  explain 
ing.  "I've  got  to  pay  her  some  attention,  under  the 
circumstances.  And  I  give  you  my  word,  I  was 
thinking  of  you  when  I  did  it."  The  wretch! 

Aunt  Selina  drew  her  breath  in  suddenly. 

"I  am  thinking  of  marrying  Reggie  Wolfe."  This 
was  Bella,  of  course.  "He  wants  me  to.  He's  a  dear 
boy." 

"If  you  do,  I  will  kill  him." 

"I  am  so  very  lonely,"  Bella  sighed.  We  could 
hear  the  creak  of  Jim's  shirt  bosom  that  showed  that 
he  had  sighed  also.  Aunt  Selina  had  gripped  me  by 

284 


IT'S    ALL   MY    FAULT 

the  arm,  and  I  could  hear  her  breathing  hard  beside 
me. 

"It's  only  Jim,"  I  whispered.  "I— I  don't  want 
to  hear  any  more." 

But  she  clutched  me  firmly,  and  the  next  thing  we 
heard  was  another  creak,  louder  and — 

"Get  up!  Get  up  off  your  knees  this  instant!" 
Bella  was  saying  frantically.  "Some  one  might 
come  in." 

"Don't  send  me  away,"  Jim  said  in  a  smothered 
voice.  "Every  one  in  the  house  is  asleep,  and  I  love 
you,  dear." 

Aunt  Selina  swallowed  hard  in  the  darkness. 

"You  have  no  right  to  make  love  to  me,"  Bella. 
"It's — it's  highly  improper,  under  the  circum 
stances." 

And  then  Jim :  "You  swallow  a  camel  and  stick 
at  a  gnat.  Why  did  you  meet  me  here,  if  you  didn't 
expect  me  to  make  love  to  you?  I've  stood  for  a 
lot,  Bella,  but  this  foolishness  will  have  to  end. 
Either  you  love  me — or  you  don't.  I'm  desperate/' 
He  drew  a  long,  forlorn  breath. 

285 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

"Poor  old  Jim!"  This  was  Bella.  A  pause. 
Then — "Let  my  hand  alone!"  Also  Bella. 

"It  is  my  hand!" — Jim's  most  fatuous  tone. 
"There  is  where  you  wore  my  ring.  There's  the 
mark  still."  Sounds  of  Jim  kissing  Bella's  ring- 
finger.  "What  did  you  do  with  it?  Throw  it 
away?"  More  sounds. 

Aunt  Selina  crossed  the  library  swiftly,  and  again 
I  followed.  Bella  was  sitting  in  a  low  chair  by  the 
fire,  looking  at  the  logs,  in  the  most  exquisite  neg 
ligee  of  pink  chiffon  and  ribbon.  Jim  was  on  his 
knees,  staring  at  her  adoringly,  and  holding  both 
her  hands. 

"I'll  tell  you  a  secret,"  Bella  was  saying,  looking 
as  coy  as  she  knew  how — which  was  considerable. 
"I — I  still  wear  it,  on  a  chain  around  my  neck." 

On  a  chain  around  her  neck!  Bella,  who  is  de- 
colette  whenever  it  is  allowable,  and  more  than  is 
proper ! 

That  was  the  limit  of  Aunt  Selina's  endurance. 
Still  holding  me,  she  stepped  through  the  doorway 
and  into  the  firelight,  a  fearful  figure. 

286 


IT'S   ALL   MY   FAULT 

Jim  saw  her  first.  He  went  quite  white  and  strug 
gled  to  get  up,  smiling  a  sickly  smile.  Bella,  after 
her  first  surprise,  was  superbly  indifferent.  She 
glanced  at  us,  raised  her  eyebrows,  and  then  looked 
at  the  clock. 

"More  victims  of  insomnia!"  she  said.  "Won't 
you  come  in?  Jim,  pull  up  a  chair  by  the  fire  for 
your  aunt." 

Aunt  Selina  opened  her  mouth  twice,  like  a  fish, 
before  she  could  speak.  Then — 

"James,  I  demand  that  that  woman  leave  the 
house !"  she  said  hoarsely. 

Bella  leaned  back  and  yawned. 

"James,  shall  I  go  ?"  she  asked  amiably. 

"Nonsense,"  Jim  said,  pulling  himself  together  as 
best  he  could.  "Look  here,  Aunt  Selina,  you  know 
she  can't  go  out,  and  what's  more,  I — don't  want 
her  to  go." 

"You — what?"  Aunt  Selina  screeched,  taking  a 
step  forward.  "You  have  the  audacity  to  say  such 
a  thing  to  me !" 

Bella  leaned  over  and  gave  the  fire  log  a  punch. 

287 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"I  was  just  saying  that  he  shouldn't  say  such 
things  to  me,  either,"  she  remarked  pleasantly.  "I'm 
afraid  you'll  take  cold,  Miss  Caruthers.  Wouldn't 
you  like  a  hot  sherry  flip?" 

Aunt  Selina  gasped.  Then  she  sat  down  heavily 
on  one  of  the  carved  teakwood  chairs. 

"He  said  he  loved  you;  I  heard  him,"  she  said 
weakly.  "He — he  was  going  to  put  his  arm  around 
you!" 

"Habit !"  Jim  put  in,  trying  to  smile.  "You  see, 
Aunt  Selina,  it's — well,  it's  a  habit  I  got  into  some 
time  ago,  and  I — my  arm  does  it  without  my  think 
ing  about  it." 

"Habit!"  Aunt  Selina  repeated,  her  voice  thick 
with  passion.  Then  she  turned  to  me.  "Go  to  your 
room  at  once!"  she  said  in  her  most  awful  tone. 
"Go  to  your  room  and  leave  this — this  shocking  af 
fair  to  me." 

But  if  she  had  reached  her  limit,  so  had  I.  If 
Jim  chose  to  ruin  himself,  it  was  not  my  fault.  Any 
one  with  common  sense  would  have  known  at  least 
to  close  the  door  before  he  went  down  on  his  knees, 

288 


IT'S    ALL    MY    FAULT 

no  matter  to  whom.  So  when  Aunt  Selina  turned 
on  me  and  pointed  in  the  direction  of  the  staircase, 
I  did  not  move. 

"I  am  perfectly  wide  awake,"  I  said  coldly.  "I 
shall  go  to  bed  when  I  am  entirely  ready,  and  not 
before.  And  as  for  Jim's  conduct,  I  do  not  know 
much  about  the  conventions  in  such  cases,  but  if  he 
wishes  to  embrace  Miss  Knowles,  and  she  wants 
him  to,  the  situation  is  interesting,  but  hardly 
novel." 

Aunt  Selina  rose  slowly  and  drew  the  folds  of 
her  dressing-gown  around  her,  away  from  the  con 
tamination  of  my  touch. 

"Do  you  know  what  you  are  saying?"  she  de 
manded  hoarsely. 

"I  do."  I  was  quite  white  and  stiff  from  my 
knees  up,  but  below  I  was  wavery.  I  glanced  at 
Jim  for  moral  support,  but  he  was  looking  idola- 
trously  at  Bella.  As  for  her,  quite  suddenly  she  had 
dropped  her  mask  of  indifference:  her  face  was 
strained  and  anxious,  and  there  were  deep  circles  I 
had  not  seen  before,  under  her  eyes.  And  it  was 

289 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

Bella  who  finally  threw  herself  into  the  breach — 
the  family  breach. 

"It  is  all  my  fault,  Miss  Caruthers,"  she  said, 
stepping  between  Aunt  Selina  and  myself.  "I  have 
been  a  blind  and  wicked  woman,  and  I  have  almost 
wrecked  two  lives." 

Two !    What  of  mine  ? 

"You  see,"  she  struggled  on,  against  the  glint  in 
Aunt  Selina's  eyes.  "I — I  did  not  realize  how 
much  I  cared,  until  it  was  too  late.  I  did  so  many 
things  that  were  cruel  and  wrong — oh,  Jim,  Jim !" 

She  turned  and  buried  her  head  on  his  shoulder 
and  cried ;  real  tears.  I  could  hardly  believe  that  it 
was  Bella.  And  Jim  put  both  his  arms  around  her 
and  almost  cried,  too,  and  looked  nauseatingly  happy 
with  the  eye  he  turned  to  Bella,  and  scared  to  death 
out  of  the  one  he  kept  on  Aunt  Selina. 

She  turned  on  me,  as  of  course  I  knew  she  would. 

"That,"  she  said,  pointing  at  Jim  and  Bella,  "that 
shameful  picture  is  due  to  your  own  indifference.  I 
am  not  blind :  I  have  seen  how  you  rejected  all  his 
loving  advances."  Bella  drew  away  from  Jim,  but 

290 


IT'S   ALL   MY   FAULT 

he  jerked  her  back.  "If  anything  in  the  world  would 
reconcile  me  to  divorce,  it  is  this  unbelievable  situa- 
ation.  James,  are  you  shameless?" 

But  James  was  and  didn't  care  who  knew  it.  And 
as  there  was  nothing  else  to  do,  and  no  one  else  to 
do  it,  I  stood  very  straight  against  the  door-frame, 
and  told  the  whole  miserable  story  from  the  very 
beginning.  I  told  how  Dal  and  Jim  had  persuaded 
me,  and  how  I  had  weakened  and  found  it  was  too 
late,  and  how  Bella  had  come  in  that  night,  when 
she  had  no  business  to  come,  and  had  sat  down  in 
the  basement  kitchen  on  my  hands  and  almost 
turned  me  into  a  raving  maniac.  As  I  went  on  I 
became  fluent:  my  sense  of  injury  grew  on  me.  I 
made  it  perfectly  clear  that  I  hated  them  all,  and 
that  when  people  got  divorces  they  ought  to  know 
their  own  minds  and  stay  divorced.  And  at  that  a 
great  light  broke  on  Aunt  Selina,  who  hadn't  un 
derstood  until  that  minute. 

In  view  of  her  principles,  she  might  have  been 
expected  to  turn  on  Jim  and  Bella,  and  disinherit 
them,  and  cast  them  out,  figuratively,  with  the 

291 


WHEN   A   MAN   MARRIES 

flaming  sword  of  her  tongue.  But  she  did  not!  She 
turned  on  me  in  the  most  terrible  way,  and  asked  me 
how  I  dared  to  come  between  husband  and  wife,  be 
cause  divorce  or  no  divorce,  whom  God  hath  joined 
together,  and  so  on.  And  when  Jim  picked  up  his 
courage  in  both  hands  and  tried  to  interfere,  she 
pushed  him  back  with  one  hand  while  she  pointed 
the  other  at  me  and  called  me  a  Jezebel. 


292 


CHAPTER   XIX 

THE   HARBISON    MAN 

SHE  talked  for  an  hour,  having 
got  between  me  and  the  door,  and 
she  scolded  Jim  and  Bella  thoroughly. 
But  they  did  not  hear  it,  being  occupied 
with  each  other,  sitting  side  by  side  meek 
ly  on  the  divan  with  Jim  holding  Bella's 
land  under  a  cushion.  She  said  they  would 
have  to  be  very  good  to  make  up  for  all  the 
deception,  but  it  was  perfectly  clear  that  it  was  a 
relief  to  her  to  find  that  I  didn't  belong  to  her  per 
manently,  and  as  I  have  said  before,  she  was  crazy 
about  Bella. 

I  sat  back  in  a  chair  and  grew  comfortably  drowsy 
in  the  monotony  of  her  voice.  It  was  a  name  that 
brought  me  to  myself  with  a  jerk. 

"Mr.  Harbison !"  Aunt  Selina  was  saying.  "Then 
bring  him  down  at  once,  James.  I  want  no  more 

293 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

deception.  There  is  no  use  cleaning  a  house  and 
leaving  a  dirty  corner." 

"It  will  not  be  necessary  for  me  to  stay  and  see  it 
swept,"  I  said,  mustering  the  rags  she  had  left  of  my 
self-respect,  and  trying  to  pass  her.  But  she  planted 
herself  squarely  before  me. 

"You  can  not  stir  up  a  dust  like  this,  young 
woman,  and  leave  other  people  to  sneeze  in  it,"  she 
said  grimly.  And  I  stayed. 

I  sat,  very  small,  on  a  chair  in  a  corner.  I  felt 
like  Jezebel,  or  whatever  her  name  was,  and  now 
the  Harbison  man  was  coming,  and  he  was  going  to 
see  me  stripped  of  my  pretensions  to  domesticity 
and  of  a  husband  who  neglected  me.  He  was  going 
to  see  me  branded  a  living  lie,  and  he  would  hate 
me  because  I  had  put  him  in  a  ridiculous  position. 
He  was  just  the  sort  to  resent  being  ridiculous. 

Jim  brought  him  down  in  a  dressing-gown  and  a 
state  of  bewilderment.  It  was  plain  that  the  mem 
ory  of  the  afternoon  still  rankled,  for  he  was  very 
short  with  Jim  and  inclined  to  resent  the  whole 
thing.  The  clock  in  the  hall  chimed  half  after  three 

294 


THE   HARBISON    MAN 

as  they  came  down  tHe  stairs,  and  I  heard  Mr.  Har 
bison  stumble  over  something  in  the  darkness  and 
say  that  if  it  was  a  joke,  he  wasn't  in  the  humor  for 
it.  To  which  Jim  retorted  that  it  wasn't  anything 
resembling  a  joke,  and  for  Heaven's  sake  not  to 
walk  on  his  feet:  he  couldn't  get  around  the  furni 
ture  any  faster. 

At  the  door  of  the  den  Mr.  Harbison  stopped, 
blinking  in  the  light.  Then,  when  he  saw  us,  he 
tried  to  back  himself  and  his  dishabille  out  into  the 
obscurity  of  the  library.  But  Aunt  Selina  was  too 
quick  for  him.  / 

"Come  in,"  she  called,  "I  want  you,  young  man. 
It  seems  that  there  are  only  two  fools  in  the  house, 
and  you  are  one." 

He  straightened  at  that  and  looked  bewildered, 
but  he  tried  to  smile. 

"I  thought  I  was  the  only  one,"  he  said.  "Is  it 
possible  that  there  is  another?" 

efl  am  the  other/'  she  announced.  I  think  she  ex 
pected  him  to  say  "Impossible,"  but,  whatever  he 
was,  he  was  never  banal. 

295 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"Is  that  so?"  he  asked  politely,  trying  to  be  inter 
ested  and  to  understand  at  the  same  time.  He  had 
not  seen  me.  He  was  gazing  fixedly  at  Bella, 
languishing  on  the  divan  and  watching  him  with 
lowered  lids,  and  he  had  given  Jim  a  side  glance  of 
contempt.  But  now  he  saw  me  and  he  colored 
under  his  tan.  His  neck  blushed  furiously,  being 
much  whiter  than  his  face.  He  kept  his  eyes  on 
mine,  and  I  knew  that  he  was  mutely  asking  forgive 
ness.  But  the  thought  of  what  was  coming  par 
alyzed  me.  My  eyes  were  glued  to  his  as  they  had 
been  that  first  evening  when  he  had  called  me  "Mrs. 
Wilson,"  and  after  an  instant  he  looked  away,  and 
his  face  was  set  and  hard. 

"It  seems  that  we  have  all  been  playing  a  little 
comedy,  Mr.  Harbison,"  Aunt  Selina  began,  nasally 
sarcastic.  "Or  rather,  you  and  I  have  been  the  audi 
ence.  The  rest  have  played." 

"I — I  don't  think  I  understand,"  he  said  slowly. 
"I  have  seen  very  little  comedy." 

"It  was  not  well  planned,"  Aunt  Selina  retorted 
tartly.  "The  idea  was  good,  but  the  young  person 

296 


THE    HARBISON    MAN 

who  was  playing  the  part  of  Mrs.  Wilson — over 
acted." 

"Oh,  come,  Aunt  Selina,"  Jim  protested,  "Kit 
was  coaxed  and  cajoled  into  this  thing.  Give  me 
fits  if  you  like ;  I  deserve  all  I  get.  But  let  Kit  alone 
— she  did  it  for  me." 

Bella  looked  over  at  me  and  smiled  nastily. 

"I  would  stop  doing  things  for  Jim,  Kit/'  she 
said.  "It  is  so  unprofitable." 

But  Mr.  Harbison  harked  back  to  Aunt  Selina' s 
speech. 

" Playing  the  part  of  Mrs.  Wilson!"  he  repeated. 
"Do  you  mean — ?" 

"Exactly.  Playing  the  part.  She  is  not  Mrs. 
Wilson.  It  seems  that  that  honor  belonged  at  one 
time  to  Miss  Knowles.  I  believe  such  things  are  not 
unknown  in  New  York,  only  why  in  the  name  of 
sense  does  a  man  want  to  divorce  a  woman  and  then 
meet  her  at  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  to  kiss  the 
place  where  his  own  wedding-ring  used  to  rest?" 

Jim  fidgeted.  Bella  was  having  spasms  of  mirth 
to  herself,  but  the  Harbison  man  did  not  smile.  He 

297 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

stood  for  a  moment  looking  at  the  fire:  then  he 
thrust  his  hands  deep  into  the  pockets  of  his  dress 
ing-gown,  and  stalked  over  to  me.  He  did  not  care 
that  the  others  were  watching  and  listening. 

"Is  it  true?"  he  demanded,  staring  down  at  me. 
"You  are  not  Mrs.  Wilson  ?  You  are  not  married  at 
all?  All  that  about  being  neglected — and  loathing 
him,  and  all  that  on  the  roof — there  was  no  founda 
tion  of  truth  ?" 

I  could  only  shake  my  head  without  looking  up. 
There  was  no  defense  to  be  made.  Oh,  I  deserved 
the  scorn  in  his  voice. 

"They — they  persuaded  you,  I  suppose,  and  it 
was  to  help  somebody?  It  was  not  a  practical 
joke?" 

"No."  I  rallied  a  little  spirit  at  that.  It  had  been 
anything  but  a  joke. 

He  drew  a  long  breath. 

"I  think  I  understand,"  he  said  slowly,  "but — 
you  could  have  saved  me  something.  I  must  have 
given  you  all  a  great  deal  of  amusement." 

"Oh,  no,"  I  protested.   "I— I  want  to  tell  you— 
298 


THE   HARBISON    MAN 

But  he  deliberately  left  me  and  went  over  to  the 
door.  There  he  turned  and  looked  down  at  Aunt 
Selina.  He  was  a  little  white,  but  there  was  no  pas 
sion  in  his  face. 

"Thank  you  for  telling  me  all  this,  Miss  Caru- 
thers,"  he  said  easily.  "Now  that  you  and  I  know, 
I'm  afraid  the  others  will  miss  their  little  diversion. 
Good  night." 

Oh,  it  was  all  right  for  Jim  to  laugh  and  say  that 
he  was  only  huffed  a  little  and  would  be  over  it  by 
morning.  I  knew  better.  There  was  something 
queer  in  his  face  as  he  went  out.  He  did  not  even 
glance  in  my  direction.  He  had  said  very  little,  but 
he  had  put  me  as  effectually  in  the  wrong  as  if  he 
had  not  kissed  me — deliberately  kissed  me — that 
very  evening,  on  the  roof. 

I  did  not  go  to  sleep  again.  I  lay  wretchedly  think 
ing  things  over  and  trying  to  remember  who  Jezebel 
was,  and  toward  morning  I  distinctly  heard  the 
knob  of  the  door  turn.  I  mistrusted  my  ears,  how 
ever,  and  so  I  got  up  quietly  and  went  over  in  the 
darkness.  There  was  no  sound  outside,  but  when  I 

299 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

put  my  hand  on  the  knob  I  felt  it  move  under  my 
fingers.  The  counter  pressure  evidently  alarmed 
whoever  it  was,  for  the  knob  was  released  and  noth 
ing  more  happened.  But  by  this  time  anything  so 
uncomplicated  as  the  fumbling  of  a  knob  at  night 
had  no  power  to  disturb  me.  I  went  back  to  bed. 


300 


CHAPTER    XX 


BREAKING  OUT  IN   A   NEW   PLACE 

HUNGER  roused  everybody 
early  the  next  morning,  Friday. 
Leila  Mercer  had  discovered  a 
box  of  bonbons  that  she  had  for 
gotten,  and  we  divided  them 
around.  Aunt  Selina  asked 
for  the  candied  fruit  and  got 
it — quite  a  third  of  the  box. 
We  gathered  in  the  lower  hall  and  on  the  stairs  and 
nibbled  nauseating  sweets  while  Mr.  Harbison  ex 
amined  the  telephone. 

He  did  not  glance  in  my  direction.  Betty  and  Dal 
were  helping  him,  and  he  seemed  very  cheerful. 
Max  sat  with  me  on  the  stairs.  Mr.  Harbison  had 
just  unscrewed  the  telephone  box  from  the  wall  and 
was  squinting  into  it,  when  Bella  came  down-stairs. 

301 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

It  was  her  first  appearance,  but  as  she  was  always 
late,  nobody  noticed.  When  she  stopped,  just  above 
us  on  the  stairs,  however,  we  looked  up,  and  she  was 
holding  to  the  rail  and  trembling  perceptibly. 

"Mr.  Harbison,  will  you — can  you  come  up 
stairs?"  she  asked.  Her  voice  was  strained,  almost 
reedy,  and  her  lips  were  white. 

Mr.  Harbison  stared  up  at  her,  with  the  telephone 
box  in  his  hands. 

"Why — er — certainly,"  he  said,  "but,  unless  it's 
very  important,  I'd  like  to  fix  this  talking  machine. 
We  want  to  make  a  food  record." 

"I'd  like  to  break  a  food  record/'  Max  put  in,  but 
Bella  created  a  diversion  by  sitting  down  suddenly 
on  the  stair  just  above  us,  and  burying  her  face  in 
her  handkerchief. 

"Jim  is  sick,"  she  said,  with  a  sob.  "He — he 
doesn't  want  anything  to  eat,  and  his  head  aches. 
He — said  for  me — to  go  away  and  let  him  die !" 

Dal  dropped  the  hammer  immediately,  and  Lollie 
Mercer  sat  petrified,  with  a  bonbon  half-way  to  her 
mouth.  For,  of  course,  it  was  unexpected,  finding 

302 


BREAKING   OUT    IN    A    NEW    PLACE 

sentiment  of  any  kind  in  Bella,  and  none  of  them 
knew  about  the  scene  in  the  den  in  the  small  hours 
of  the  morning. 

"Sick!"  Aunt  Selina  said,  from  a  hall  chair. 
"Sick!  Where?" 

"All  over,"  Bella  quavered.  "His  poor  head  is 
hot,  and  he's  thirsty,  but  he  doesn't  want  anything 
but  water." 

"Great  Scott!"  Dal  said  suddenly.  "Suppose  he 
should — Bella,  are  you  telling  us  all  his  symptoms  ?" 

Bella  put  down  her  handkerchief  and  got  up. 
From  her  position  on  the  stairs  she  looked  down  on 
us  with  something  of  her  old  haughty  manner. 

"If  he  is  ill,  you  may  blame  yourselves,  all  of 
you,"  she  said  cruelly.  "You  taunted  him  with  being 
— fat,  and  laughed  at  him,  until  he  stopped  eating 
the  things  he  should  eat.  And  he  has  been  exercising 
— on  the  roof,  until  he  has  worn  himself  out.  And 
now — he  is  ill.  He — he  has  a  rash." 

Everybody  jumped  at  that,  and  we  instinctively 
moved  away  from  Bella.  She  was  quite  cold  and 
scornful  by  that  time. 

303 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

"A  rash !"  Max  exclaimed.    "What  sort  of  rash  ?" 

"I  did  not  see  it,"  Bella  said  with  dignity,  and 
turning  she  went  up  the  stairs. 

There  was  a  great  deal  of  excitement,  and  nobody 
except  Mr.  Harbison  was  willing  to  go  near  Jim. 
He  went  up  at  once  with  Bella,  while  Max  and  Dal 
sat  cravenly  down-stairs  and  wondered  if  we  would 
all  take  it,  and  Anne  told  about  a  man  she  knew  who 
had  it,  and  was  deaf  and  dumb  and  blind  when  he 
recovered. 

Mr.  Harbison  came  down  after  a  while,  and  said 
that  the  rash  was  there,  right  enough,  and  that  Jim 
absolutely  refused  to  be  quarantined ;  that  he  insisted 
that  he  always  got  a  rash  from  early  strawberries 
and  that  if  he  did  have  anything,  since  they  were  so 
touchy  he  hoped  they  would  all  get  it.  If  they  locked 
him  in  he  would  kick  the  door  down. 

We  had  a  long  conference  in  the  hall,  with  Bella 
sitting  red-eyed  and  objecting  to  every  suggestion 
we  made.  And  finally  we  arranged  to  shut  Jim  up 
in  one  of  the  servants'  bedrooms  with  a  sheet  wrung 
out  of  disinfectant  hung  over  the  door.  Bella  said  she 

304 


BREAKING   OUT    IN    A    NEW    PLACE 

would  sit  outside  in  the  hall  and  read  to  him  through 
the  closed  door,  so  finally  he  gave  a  grudging  con 
sent.  But  he  was  in  an  awful  humor.  Max  and 
Dal  put  on  rubber  gloves  and  helped  him  over,  and 
they  said  afterward  that  the  way  he  talked  was 
fearful.  And  there  was  a  telephone  in  the  maid's 
room,  and  he  kept  asking  for  things  every  five  min 
utes. 

When  the  doctor  came  he  said  it  was  too  early  to 
tell  positively,  and  he  ordered  him  liquid  diet  and 
said  he  would  be  back  that  evening. 

Which — the  diet — takes  me  back  to  the  famine. 
After  they  had  moved  Jim,  Mr.  Harbison  went  back 
to  the  telephone,  and  found  everything  as  it  should 
be.  So  he  followed  the  telephone  wire,  and  the  rest 
followed  him.  I  did  not :  he  had  systematically  ig 
nored  me  all  morning,  after  having  dared  to  kiss  me 
the  night  before.  And  any  other  man  I  knew,  after 
looking  at  me  the  way  he  had  looked  a  dozen  times, 
would  have  been  at  least  reasonably  glad  to  find  me 
free  and  unmarried.  But  it  was  clear  that  he  was 
not :  I  wondered  if  he  was  the  kind  of  man  who  al- 

305 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

ways  makes  love  to  the  other  man's  wife  and  runs 
like  mad  when  she  is  left  a  widow,  or  gets  a  divorce. 

And  just  when  I  had  decided  that  I  hated  him, 
and  that  there  was  one  man  I  knew  who  would 
never  make  love  to  a  woman  whom  he  thought  mar 
ried  and  then  be  very  dignified  and  aloof  when  he 
found  she  wasn't,  I  heard  what  was  wrong  with  the 
telephone  wire. 

It  had  been  cut !  Cut  through  with  a  pair  of  sil 
ver  manicure  scissors  from  the  dressing-table  in 
Bella's  room,  where  Aunt  Selina  slept!  The  wire 
had  been  clipped  where  it  came  into  the  house,  just 
under  a  window,  and  the  scissors  still  lay  on  the  sill. 

It  was  mysterious  enough,  but  no  one  was  inter 
ested  in  the  mystery  just  then.  We  wanted  food, 
and  wanted  it  at  once.  Mr.  Harbison  fixed  the  wire, 
and  the  first  thing  we  did,  of  course,  was  to  order 
something  to  eat.  Aunt  Selina  went  to  bed  just 
after  luncheon  with  indigestion,  to  the  relief  of 
every  one  in  the  house.  She  had  been  most  unpleas 
ant  all  morning. 

When  she  found  herself  ill,  however,  she  insisted 
306 


BREAKING   OUT   IN   A   NEW   PLACE 

on  having  Bella,  and  that  made  trouble  at  once.  We 
found  Bella  with  her  cheek  against  the  door  into 
Jim's  room,  looking  maudlin  while  he  shouted  love 
messages  to  her  from  the  other  side.  At  first  she  re 
fused  to  stir,  but  after  Anne  and  Max  had  tried  and 
failed,  the  rest  of  us  went  to  her  in  a  body  and  im 
plored  her.  We  said  Aunt  Selina  was  in  awful  shape 
— which  she  was,  as  to  temper — and  that  she  had 
thrown  a  mustard  plaster  at  Anne,  which  was  true. 

So  Bella  went,  grumbling,  and  Jim  was  a  maniac. 
We  had  not  thought  it  would  be  so  bad  for  Bella, 
but  Aunt  Selina  fell  asleep  soon  after  she  took 
charge,  holding  Bella's  hand,  and  slept  for  three 
hours  and  never  let  go ! 

About  two  that  afternoon  the  sun  came  out,  and 
the  rest  of  us  went  to  the  roof.  The  sleet  had  melted 
and  the  air  was  fairly  warm.  Two  housemaids  dust 
ing  rugs  on  the  top  of  the  next  house  came  over  and 
stared  at  us,  and  somebody  in  an  automobile  down 
on  Riverside  Drive  stood  up  and  waved  at  us.  It 
was  very  cheerful  and  hopelessly  lonely. 

I  stayed  on  the  roof  after  the  others  had  gone, 
307 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

and  for  some  time  I  thought  I  was  alone.  After 
a  while,  I  got  a  whiff  of  smoke,  and  then  I  saw  Mr. 
Harbison  far  over  in  the  corner,  one  foot  on  the 
parapet,  moodily  smoking  a  pipe.  He  was  gazing 
out  over  the  river,  and  paying  no  attention  to  me. 
This  was  natural,  considering  that  I  had  hardly 
spoken  to  him  all  day. 

I  would  not  let  him  drive  me  away,  so  I  sat  still, 
and  it  grew  darker  and  colder.  He  filled  his  pipe 
now  and  then,  but  he  never  looked  in  my  direction. 
Finally,  however,  as  it  grew  very  dusk,  he  knocked 
the  ashes  out  and  came  toward  me. 

"I  am  going  to  make  a  request,  Miss  McNair," 
he  said  evenly.  "Please  keep  off  the  roof  after  sun 
set.  There  are — reasons."  I  had  risen  and  was  pre 
paring  to  go  down-stairs. 

"Unless  I  know  the  reasons,  I  refuse  to  do  any 
thing  of  the  kind,"  I  retorted.  He  bowed. 

"Then  the  door  will  be  kept  locked,"  he  rejoined, 
and  opened  it  for  me.  He  did  not  follow  me,  but 
stood  watching  until  I  was  down,  and  I  heard  him 
close  the  roof  door  firmly  behind  me. 

308 


CHAPTER  XXI 

A  BAR  OF  SOAP 

LATE  that  evening  Betty  Mercer  and 
Dallas  were  writing  verses  of  condo 
lence  to  be  signed  by  all  of  us  and  put 
under  the  door  into  Jim's  room  when 
Bella  came  running  down  the  stairs. 
Dal  was  reading  the  first  verse  when 
she  came.    "Listen  to  this,  Bella,"  he  said 
triumphantly : 

"There  was  a  fat  artist  named  Jas, 
Who  cruelly  called  his  friends  nas. 

When,  altho'  shut  up  tight, 

He  broke  out  over  night 
With  a  rash  that  is  maddening,  he  clas." 

Then  he  caught  sight  of  Bella's  face  as  she  stood 
in  the  doorway,  and  stopped. 

"Jim    is    delirious!"    she   announced   tragically. 

309 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

"You  shut  him  in  there  all  alone  and  now  he's  de 
lirious.  I'll  never  forgive  any  of  you." 

"Delirious!"  everybody  exclaimed. 

"He  was  sane  enough  when  I  took  him  his  chick 
en  broth,"  Mr.  Harbison  said.  "He  was  almost 
fluent." 

"He  is  starlt,  staring  crazy,"  Bella  insisted  hys 
terically.  "I — I  locked  the  door  carefully  when  I 
went  down  to  my  dinner,  and  when  I  came  up  it — 
it  was  unlocked,  and  Jim  was  babbling  on  the  bed, 
with  a  sheet  over  his  face.  He — he  says  the  house 
is  haunted  and  he  wants  all  the  men  to  come  up  and 
sit  in  the  room  with  him." 

"Not  on  your  life,"  Max  said.  "I  am  young,  and 
my  career  has  only  begun.  I  don't  intend  to  be  cut 
off  in  the  flower  of  my  youth.  But  I'll  tell  you 
what  I  will  do ;  I'll  take  him  a  drink.  I  can  tie  it  to  a 
pole  or  something." 

But  Mr.  Harbison  did  not  smile.  He  was 
thoughtful  for  a  minute.  Then : 

"I  don't  believe  he  is  delirious,"  he  said  quietly, 
"and  I  wouldn't  be  surprised  if  he  has  happened  on 

310 


A   BAR   OF   SOAP 

something  tHat — will  be  of  general  interest.  I  think 
I  will  stay  with  him  to-night." 

After  that,  of  course,  none  of  the  others  would 
confess  that  he  was  afraid,  so  with  the  South  Amer 
ican  leading,  they  all  went  up-stairs.  The  women 
of  the  party  sat  on  the  lower  steps  and  listened,  but 
everything  was  quiet.  Now  and  then  we  could 
hear  the  sound  of  voices,  and  after  a  while  there 
was  a  rapid  slamming  of  doors  and  the  sound  of 
some  one  running  down  to  the  second  floor.  Then 
quiet  again. 

None  of  us  felt  talkative.  Bella  had  followed  the 
men  up  and  had  been  put  out,  and  sat  sniffling  by 
herself  in  the  den.  Aunt  Selina  was  working  over 
a  jig-saw  puzzle  in  the  library,  and  declaring  that 
some  of  it  must  be  lost.  Anne  and  Leila  Mercer 
were  embroidering,  and  Betty  and  I  sat  idle,  our 
hands  in  our  laps.  The  whole  atmosphere  of  the 
house  was  mysterious.  Anne  told  over  again  of  the 
strange  noises  the  night  her  necklace  was  stolen. 
Betty  asked  me  about  the  time  when  the  comfort 
slipped  from  under  my  ringers.  'And  when,  in  the 


BELLA  SAT  SNIFFLING  BY  HERSELF  IN  THE  DEN 


A    BAR    OF    SOAP 

midst  of  the  story,  the  telephone  rang,  we  all  jumped 
and  shrieked. 

In  an  hour  or  so  they  sent  for  Flannigan,  and  he 
went  up-stairs.  He  came  down  again  soon,  how 
ever,  and  returned  with  something  over  his  arm  that 
looked  like  a  rope.  It  seemed  to  be  made  of  all 
kinds  of  things  tied  together,  trunk  straps,  clothes 
line,  bed  sheets,  and  something  that  Flannigan 
pointed  to  with  rage  and  said  he  hadn't  been  able 
to  keep  his  clothes  on  all  day.  He  refused  to  ex 
plain  further,  however,  and  trailed  the  nondescript 
article  up  the  stairs.  We  could  only  gaze  after  him 
and  wonder  what  it  all  meant. 

The  conclave  lasted  far  into  the  night.  The 
feminine  contingent  went  to  bed,  but  not  to  sleep. 
Some  time  after  midnight,  Mr.  Harbison  and  Max 
went  down-stairs  and  I  could  hear  them  rattling 
around  testing  windows  and  burglar  alarms.  But 
finally  every  one  settled  down  and  the  rest  of  the 
night  was  quiet. 

Betty  Mercer  came  into  my  room  the  next  morn 
ing,  Sunday,  and  said  Anne  Brown  wanted  me.  I 

3*3 


WHEN    A   MAN    MARRIES 

went  over  at  once,  and  Anne  was  sitting  up  in  bed, 
crying.  Dal  had  slipped  out  of  the  room  at  day 
light,  she  said,  and  hadn't  come  back.  He  had 
thought  she  was  asleep,  but  she  wasn't,  and  she 
knew  he  was  dead,  for  nothing  ever  made  Dal  get 
up  on  Sunday  before  noon. 

There  was  no  one  moving  in  the  house,  and  I 
hardly  knew  what  to  do.  It  was  Betty  who  said  she 
would  go  up  and  rouse  Mr.  Harbison  and  Max,  who 
had  taken  Jim's  place  in  the  studio.  She  started  out 
bravely  enough,  but  in  a  minute  we  heard  her  flying 
back.  Anne  grew  perfectly  white. 

"He's  lying  on  the  upper  stairs !"  Betty  cried,  and 
we  all  ran  out.  It  was  quite  true.  Dal  was  lying 
on  the  stairs  in  a  bath-robe,  with  one  of  Jim's  In 
dian  war-clubs  in  his  hand.  And  he  was  sound 
asleep. 

He  looked  somewhat  embarrassed  when  he  roused 
and  saw  us  standing  around.  He  said  he  was  going 
to  play  a  practical  joke  on  somebody  and  fell  asleep 
in  the  middle  of  it.  And  Anne  said  he  wasn't  even 
an  intelligent  liar,  and  went  back  to  bed  in  a  temper. 

314 


A  BAR   OF   SOAP 

But  Betty  came  in  with  me,  and  we  sat  and  looked 
at  each  other  and  didn't  say  much.  The  situation 
was  beyond  us. 

The  doctor  let  Jim  out  the  next  day,  there  having 
been  nothing  the  matter  with  him  but  a  stomach 
rash.  But  Jim  was  changed;  he  mooned  around 
Bella,  of  course,  as  before,  but  he  was  abstracted  at 
times,  and  all  that  day — Sunday — he  wandered  off 
by  himself,  and  one  would  come  across  him  unex 
pectedly  in  the  basement  or  along  some  of  the  un 
used  back  halls. 

Aunt  Selina  held  service  that  morning.  Jim  said 
that  he  always  had  a  prayer-book,  but  that  he 
couldn't  find  anything  with  so  many  people  in  the 
house.  So  Aunt  Selina  read  some  religious  poetry 
out  of  the  newspapers,  and  gave  us  a  valuable  talk 
on  Deception  versus  Honesty,  with  me  as  the  illus 
tration. 

Almost  everybody  took  a  nap  after  luncheon.  I 
stayed  in  the  den  and  read  Ibsen,  and  felt  very 
mournful.  And  after  Hedda  had  shot  herself,  I  lay 
down  on  the  divan  and  cried  a  little — over  Hedda; 

315 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

she  was  young  and  it  was  such  a  tragic  ending — and 
then  I  fell  asleep. 

When  I  wakened  Mr.  Harbison  was  standing  by 
the  table,  and  he  held  my  book  in  his  hands.  In 
view  of  the  armed  neutrality  between  us,  I  expected 
to  see  him  bow  to  me  curtly,  turn  on  his  heel  and 
leave  the  room.  Indeed,  considering  his  state  of 
mind  the  night  before,  I  should  hardly  have  been 
surprised  if  he  had  thrown  Hedda  at  my  head. 
(This  is  not  a  pun.  I  detest  them.)  But  instead, 
when  he  heard  me  move  he  glanced  over  at  me  and 
even  smiled  a  little. 

"She  wasn't  worth  it,"  he  said,  indicating  the 
book. 

"Worth  what?" 

"Your  tears.  You  were  crying  over  it,  weren't 
you?" 

"She  was  very  unhappy,"  I  asserted  indifferently. 
"She  was  married  and  she  loved  some  one  else." 

"Do  you  really  think  she  did?"  he  asked.  "And 
even  so,  was  that  a  reason  ?" 

316 


A    BAR    OF    SOAP 

"The  other  man  cared  for  her;  he  may  not  have 
been  able  to  help  it." 

"But  he  knew  that  she  was  married,"  he  said  virtu 
ously,  and  then  he  caught  my  eye  and  he  saw  the 
analogy  instantly,  for  he  colored  hotly  and  put  down 
the  book. 

"Most  men  argue  that  way,"  I  said.  "They  argue 
by  the  book,  and — they  do  as  they  like/' 

He  picked  up  a  Japanese  ivory  paper  weight  from 
the  table,  and  stood  balancing  it  across  his  finger. 

"You  are  perfectly  right,"  he  said  at  last.  "I  de 
serve  it  all.  My  grievance  is  at  myself.  Your — 
your  beauty,  and  the  fact  that  I  thought  you  were 
unhappy,  put  me — beside  myself.  It  is  not  an  ex 
cuse;  it  is  a  weak  explanation.  I  will  not  forget 
myself  again." 

He  was  as  abject  as  any  one  could  have  wished. 
It  was  my  minute  of  triumph,  but  I  can  not  pretend 
that  I  was  happy.  Evidently  it  had  been  only  a 
passing  impulse.  If  he  had  really  cared,  now  that 
he  knew  I  was  free,  he  would  have  forgotten  him- 

317 


DAL  WAS  LYING  ON  THE  STAIRS  IN   A  BATH-ROBE  SOUND  ASLEEP 


A   BAR   OF    SOAP 

self  again  at  once.  Then  a  new  explanation  occurred 
to  me.  Suppose  it  had  been  Bella  all  the  time,  and 
the  real  shock  had  been  to  find  that  she  had  been 
married ! 

"The  fault  of  the  situation  was  really  mine," 
I  said  magnanimously;  "I  quite  blame  myself. 
Only,  you  must  believe  one  thing.  You  never  fur 
nished  us  any  amusement."  I  looked  at  him  side- 
wise.  The  discovery  that  Bella  and  Jim  were  once 
married  must  have  been  a  great  shock. 

"It  was  a  surprise,"  he  replied  evenly.  His  voice 
and  his  eyes  were  inscrutable.  He  returned  my 
glance  steadily.  It  was  infuriating  to  have  gone 
half-way  to  meet  him,  as  I  had,  and  then  to  find  him 
intrenched  in  his  self-sufficiency  again.  I  got  up. 

"It  is  unfortunate  that  our  acquaintance  has  be 
gun  so  unfavorably,"  I  remarked,  preparing  to  pass 
him.  "Under  other  circumstances  we  might  have 
been  friends." 

"There  is  only  one  solace,"  he  said.  "When  we 
do  not  have  friends,  we  can  not  lose  them." 

He  opened  the  door  to  let  me  pass  out,  and  as  our 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

eyes  met,  all  the  coldness  died  out  of  his.  He  held 
out  his  hand,  but  I  was  hurt.  I  refused  to  see  it. 

"Kit!"  he  said  unsteadily.  "I — I'm  an  obstinate, 
pig-headed  brute.  I  am  sorry.  Can't  we  be  friends, 
after  all?" 

1  'When  we  do  not  have  friends  we  can  not  lose 
them,'  "  I  replied  with  cool  malice.  And  the  next  in 
stant  the  door  closed  behind  me. 

It  was  that  night  that  the  really  serious  event  of 
the  quarantine  occurred. 

We  were  gathered  in  the  library,  and  everybody 
was  deadly  dull.  Aunt  Selina  said  she  had  been 
reared  to  a  strict  observance  of  the  Sabbath,  and 
she  refused  to  go  to  bed  early.  The  cards  and  card- 
tables  were  put  away  and  every  one  sat  around  and 
quarreled  and  was  generally  nasty,  except  Bella  and 
Jim,  who  had  gone  into  the  den  just  after  dinner 
and  firmly  closed  the  door. 

I  think  it  was  just  after  Max  proposed  to  me. 
Yes,  he  proposed  to  me  again  that  night.  He  said 
that  Jim's  illness  had  decided  him;  that  any  of  us 
might  take  sick  and  die,  shut  in  that  contaminated 

320 


A   BAR   OF   SOAP 

atmosphere,  and  that  if  he  did  he  wanted  it  all  set 
tled.  And  whether  I  took  him  or  not  he  wanted 
me  to  remember  him  kindly  if  anything  happened. 
I  really  hated  to  refuse  him — he  was  in  such  deadly 
earnest.  But  it  was  quite  unnecessary  for  him  to 
have  blamed  his  refusal,  as  he  did,  on  Mr.  Harbi 
son.  I  am  sure  I  had  refused  him  plenty  of  times 
before  I  had  ever  heard  of  the  man.  Yes,  it  was 
just  after  he  proposed  to  me  that  Flannigan  came  to 
the  door  and  called  Mr.  Harbison  out  into  the  hall. 

Flannigan — like  most  of  the  people  in  the  house — 
always  went  to  Mr.  Harbison  when  there  was  any 
thing  to  be  done.  He  openly  adored  him,  and — 
what  was  more — he  did  what  Mr.  Harbison  ordered 
without  a  word,  while  the  rest  of  us  had  to  get 
down  on  our  knees  and  beg. 

Mr.  Harbison  went  out,  muttering  something 
about  a  storm  coming  up,  and  seeing  that  the  tent 
was  secure.  Betty  Mercer  went  with  him.  She 
had  been  at  his  heels  all  evening,  and  called  him 
"Tom"  on  every  possible  occasion.  Indeed,  she 
made  no  secret  of  it :  she  said  that  she  was  mad  about 

321 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

him,  and  that  she  would  love  to  live  in  South  Amer 
ica,  and  have  an  Indian  squaw  for  a  lady's-maid,  and 
sit  out  on  the  veranda  in  the  evenings  and  watch  the 
Southern  Cross  shooting-  across  the  sky,  and  eat 
tropical  food  from  the  quaint  Indian  pottery.  She 
was  not  even  daunted  when  Dal  told  her  the  South 
ern  Cross  did  not  shoot,  and  that  the  food  was  prob 
ably  canned  corn  on  tin  dishes. 

So  Betty  went  with  him.  She  wore  a  pale  yellow 
dinner  gown,  with  just  a  sophisticated  touch  of 
black  here  and  there,  and  cut  modestly  square  in  the 
neck.  Her  shoulders  are  scrawny.  And  after  they 
were  gone — not  her  shoulders;  Mr.  Harbison  and 
she — Aunt  Selina  announced  that  the  next  day  was 
Monday,  that  she  had  only  a  week's  supply  of  cloth 
ing  with  her,  and  that  no  policeman  who  ever  swung 
a  mace  should  wash  her  undergarments  for  her. 

She  paused  a  moment,  but  nobody  offered  to  do  it. 
Anne  was  reading  De  Maupassant  under  cover  of  a 
table,  and  the  rest  pretended  not  to  hear.  After  a 
pause,  Aunt  Selina  got  up  heavily  and  went  up 
stairs,  coming  down  sooti  after  with  a  bundle  cov- 

§22 


A    BAR    OF   SOAP 

ered  with  a  green  shawl,  and  with  a  white  balbriggan 
stocking  trailing  from  an  opening  in  it.  She  paused 
at  the  library  door,  surveyed  the  inmates,  caught  my 
unlucky  eye  and  beckoned  to  me  with  a  relentless 
forefinger. 

"We  can  put  them  to  soak  to-night,"  she  confided 
to  me,  "and  to-morrow  they  will  be  quite  simple  to 
do.  There  is  no  lace  to  speak  of" — Dal  raised  his 
eyebrows — "and  very  little  flouncing." 

Aunt  Selina  and  I  went  to  the  laundry.  It  never 
occurred  to  any  one  that  Bella  should  have  gone : 
she  had  stepped  into  all  my  privileges — such  as  they 
were — and  assumed  none  of  my  obligations.  Aunt 
Selina  and  /  went  to  the  laundry. 

It  is  strange  what  big  things  develop  from  little 
ones.  In  this  case  it  was  a  bar  of  soap.  And  if 
Flannigan  had  used  as  much  soap  as  he  should  have 
instead  of  washing  up  the  kitchen  floor  with  cold 
dish  water,  it  would  have  developed  sooner.  The 
two  most  unexpected  events  of  the  whole  quarantine 
occurred  that  night  at  the  same  time,  one  on  the  roof 
and  one  in  the  cellar.  The  cellar  one,  although 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

curious,  was  not  so  serious  as  the  other,  so  it  comes 
first. 

Aunt  Selina  put  her  clothes  in  a  tub  in  the  laun 
dry  and  proceeded  to  dress  them  like  a  vegetable. 
She  threw  in  a  handful  of  salt,  some  kerosene  oil 
and  a  little  ammonia.  The  result  was  villainous, 
but  after  she  tasted  it — or  snuffed  it — she  said  it 
needed  a  bar  of  soap  cut  up  to  give  it  strength — or 
flavor — and  I  went  into  the  store-room  for  it. 

The  laundry  soap  was  in  a  box.  I  took  in  a  silver 
fork,  for  I  hated  to  touch  the  stuff,  and  jabbed  a 
bar  successfully  in  the  semi-darkness.  Then  I  car 
ried  it  back  to  the  laundry  and  dropped  it  on  the 
table.  Aunt  Selina  looked  at  the  fork  with  disgust : 
then  we  both  looked  at  the  soap.  One  side  of  it  was 
covered  with  round  holes  that  curved  around  on 
each  other  like  a  coiled  snake. 

I  ran  back  to  the  store-room,  and  there,  a  little  bit 
sticky  and  smelling  terribly  of  rosin,  lay  Anne's 
pearl  necklace ! 

I  was  so  excited  that  I  seized  Aunt  Selina  by  the 
hands  and  danced  her  all  over  the  place.  Then  I  left 

324 


A   BAR    OF    SOAP 

her,  trying  to  find  her  hair-pins  on  the  floor,  and  ran 
up  to  tell  the  others.  I  met  Betty  in  the  hall,  and 
waved  the  pearls  at  her.  But  she  did  not  notice 
them. 

"Is  Mr.  Harbison  down  there  ?"  she  asked  breath 
lessly.  "I  left  him  on  the  roof  and  went  down  to 
my  room  for  my  scarf,  and  when  I  went  back  he 
had  disappeared.  He — he  doesn't  seem  to  be  in  the 
house."  She  tried  to  laugh,  but  her  voice  was  shaky. 
"He  couldn't  have  got  down  without  passing  me, 
anyhow,"  she  supplemented.  "I  suppose  I'm  silly, 
but  so  many  queer  things  have  happened,  Kit." 

"I  wouldn't  worry,  Betty,"  I  soothed  her.  "He 
is  big  enough  to  take  care  of  himself.  And  with 
the  best  intentions  in  the  world,  you  can't  have  him 
all  the  time,  you  know." 

She  was  too  much  startled  to  be  indignant.  She 
followed  me  into  the  library,  where  the  sight  of  the 
pearls  produced  a  tremendous  excitement,  and  then 
every  one  had  to  go  down  to  the  store-room,  and 
see  where  the  necklace  had  been  hidden,  and  Max 
examined  all  the  bars  of  soap  for  thumb  prints. 

325 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Mr.  Harbison  did  not  appear.  Max  commented 
on  the  fact  caustically,  but  Dal  hushed  him  up.  And 
so,  Anne  hugging  her  pearls,  and  Aunt  Selina  hav 
ing  put  a  final  seasoning  of  washing  powder  on  the 
clothes  in  the  tub,  we  all  went  up-stairs  to  bed.  It 
had  been  a  long  day,  and  the  morning  would  at 
least  bring  bridge. 

I  was  almost  ready  for  bed  when  Jim  tapped  at 
my  door.  I  had  been  very  cool  to  him  since  the 
night  in  the  library  when  I  was  publicly  staked  and 
martyred,  and  he  was  almost  cringing  when  I 
opened  the  door. 

"What  is  it  now?"  I  asked  cruelly.  "Has  Bella 
tired  of  it  already,  or  has  somebody  else  a  rash  ?" 

"Don't  be  a  shrew,  Kit,"  he  said.  "I  don't  want 
you  to  do  anything.  I  only — when  did  you  see  Har 
bison  last?'' 

"If  you  mean  'last,'  "  I  retorted,  "I'm  afraid  I 
haven't  seen  the  last  of  him  yet."  Then  I  saw  that 
he  was  really  worried.  "Betty  was  leading  him  to 
the  roof,"  I  added.  "Why?  Is  he  missing?" 

"He  isn't  anywhere  in  the  house.    Dal  and  I  have 

326 


A   BAR    OF    SOAP 

been  over  every  inch  of  it."  Max  had  come  up,  in 
a  dressing-gown,  and  was  watching  me  insolently. 

"I  think  we  have  seen  the  last  of  him,"  he  said. 
"I'm  sorry,  Kit,  to  nip  the  little  romance  in  the  bud. 
The  fellow  was  crazy  about  you — there's  no  doubt 
of  it.  But  I've  been  watching  him  from  the  begin 
ning,  and  I  think  I'm  upheld.  Whether  he  went 
down  the  water-spout,  or  across  a  board  to  the  next 
house — " 

"I — I  dislike  him  intensely,"  I  said  angrily,  "but 
you  would  not  dare  to  say  that  to  his  face.  He 
could  strangle  you  with  one  hand." 

Max  laughed  disagreeably. 

"Well,  I  only  hope  he  is  gone,"  he  threw  at  me 
over  his  shoulder,  "I  wouldn't  want  to  be  respon 
sible  to  your  father  if  he  had  stayed."  I  was  speech 
less  with  wrath. 

They  went  away  then,  and  I  could  hear  them  go 
ing  over  the  house.  At  one  o'clock  Jim  went  up  to 
bed,  the  last,  and  Mr.  Harbison  had  not  been  found. 
I  did  not  see  how  they  could  go  to  bed  at  all.  If 
he  had  escaped,  then  Max  was  right  and  the  whole 

327 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

thing  was  heart-breaking.    And  if  he  had  not,  then 
he  might  be  lying — 
I  got  up  and  dressed. 

The  early  part  of  the  night  had  been  cloudy,  but 
when  I  got  to  the  roof  it  was  clear  starlight.     The 
wind  blew  through  the  electric  wires  strung  across 
and  set  them  singing.     The  occasional  bleat  of  a 
belated  automobile  on  the  drive  below  came  up  to 
me  raucously.    The  tent  gleamed,  a  starlit  ghost  of 
itself,  and  the  boxwoods  bent  in  the  breeze.  I  went 
over  to  the  parapet  and  leaned  my  elbows  on  it.    I 
had  done  the  same  thing  so  often  before ;  I  had  car 
ried  all  my  times  of  stress  so  infallibly  to  that  par 
ticular  place,  that  instinctively  my  feet  turned  there. 
And  there  in  the  starlight,  I  went  over  the  whole 
serio-comedy,  and  I  loathed  my  part  in  it.    He  had 
been  perfectly  right  to  be  angry  with  me  and  with 
all  of  us.    And  I  had  been  a  hypocrite  and  a  Pharisee, 
and  had  thanked  God  that  I  was  not  as  other  people, 
when  the  fact  was  that  I  was  worse  than  the  worst. 
And  although  it  wasn't  dignified  to  think  of  him 
going  down  the  drain  pipe,  still — no  one  could  blame 

328 


A   BAR   OF   SOAP 

him  for  wanting  to  get  away  from  us,  and  he  was 
quite  muscular  enough  to  do  it. 

I  was  in  the  depths  of  self-abasement  when  I 
heard  a  sound  behind  me.  It  was  a  long  breath, 
quite  audible,  that  ended  in  a  groan.  I  gripped  the 
parapet  and  listened,  while  my  heart  pounded,  and 
in  a  minute  it  came  again. 

I  was  terribly  frightened.  Then — I  don't  know 
how  I  did  it,  but  I  was  across  the  roof,  kneeling  be 
side  the  tent,  where  it  stood  against  the  chimney. 
And  there,  lying  prone  among  the  flower-pots,  and 
almost  entirely  hidden,  lay  the  man  we  had  been 
looking  for. 

His  head  was  toward  me,  and  I  reached  out  shak- 
ingly  and  touched  his  face.  It  was  cold,  and  my 
hand,  when  I  drew  it  back,  was  covered  with  blood. 


329 


CHAPTER  XXII 

IT   WAS   DELIRIUM 

I  WAS  sure  he  was  dead.  He  did 
not  move,  and  when  I  caught  his 
hands  and  called  him  frantically, 
he  did  not  hear  me.  And  so,  with 
the  horror  over  me,  I  half  fell 
down  the  stairs  and  roused  Jim 
in  the  studio. 

They  all  came  with  lights  and  blankets, 
and  they  carried  him  into  the  tent  and  put  him  on 
the  couch  and  tried  to  put  whisky  in  his  mouth.  But 
he  could  not  swallow.  And  the  silence  became  more 
and  more  ominous  until  finally  Anne  got  hysterical 
and  cried,  "He  is  dead !  dead !"  and  collapsed  on  the 
roof. 

But  he  was  not.     Just  as  the  lights  in  the  tent 
began  to  have  red  rings  around  them  and  Jim's 

330 


IT    WAS    DELIRIUM 

voice  came  from  away  across  the  river,  somebody 
said,  "There,  he  swallowed  that,"  and  soon  after, 
he  opened  his  eyes.  He  muttered  something  that 
sounded  like  "Andean  pinnacle"  and  lapsed  into  un 
consciousness  again.  But  he  was  not  dead !  He  was 
not  dead! 

When  the  doctor  came  they  made  a  stretcher  out 
of  one  of  Jim's  six-foot  canvases — it  had  a  picture 
on  it,  and  Jim  was  angry  enough  the  next  day — and 
took  him  down  to  the  studio.  We  made  it  as  much 
like  a  sick-room  as  we  could,  and  we  tried  to  make 
him  comfortable.  But  he  lay  without  opening  his 
eyes,  and  at  dawn  the  doctor  brought  a  consultant 
and  a  trained  nurse. 

The  nurse  was  an  offensively  capable  person.  She 
put  us  all  out,  and  scolded  Anne  for  lighting  Japa 
nese  incense  in  the  room — although  Anne  explained 
that  it  is  very  reviving.  And  she  said  that  it  was 
unnecessary  to  have  a  dozen  people  breathing  up  all 
the  oxygen  and  asphyxiating  the  patient.  She  was 
good  looking,  too.  I  disliked  her  at  once.  Any  one 
could  see  by  the  way  .she  took  his  pulse — just  let- 

331 


I  DON'T  KNOW  WHY  MOTHER  DIDN'T  LET  ME  STUDY  NURSING 


IT   WAS    DELIRIUM 

ting  his  poor  hand  hang,  without  any  support — that 
she  was  a  purely  mechanical  creature,  without  heart. 

Well,  as  I  said  before,  she  put  us  all  out,  and 
shut  the  door,  and  asked  us  not  to  whisper  outside. 
Then,  too,  she  refused  to  allow  any  flowers  in  the 
room,  although  Betty  had  got  a  florist  out  of  bed  to 
order  some. 

The  consultant  came,  stayed  an  hour,  and  left. 
Aunt  Selina,  who  proved  herself  a  trump  in  that 
trying  time,  waylaid  him  in  the  hall,  and  he  said  it 
might  be  a  fractured  skull,  although  it  was  possibly 
only  concussion. 

The  men  spent  most  of  the  morning  together  in 
the  den,  with  the  door  shut.  Now  and  then  one  of 
them  would  tiptoe  up-stairs,  ask  the  nurse  how  her 
patient  was  doing,  and  creak  down  again.  Just  be 
fore  noon  they  all  went  to  the  roof  and  examined 
again  the  place  where  he  had  been  found.  I  know, 
for  I  was  in  the  upper  hall,  outside  the  studio.  I 
stayed  there  almost  all  day,  and  after  a  while  the 
nurse  let  me  bring  her  things  as  she  needed  them. 
I  don't  know  why  mother  didn't  let  me  study 

333 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

nursing — I  always  wanted  to  do  it.  And  I  felt  help 
less  and  childish  now,  when  there  were  things  to  be 
done. 

Max  came  down  from  the  roof  alone,  and  I  cor 
nered  him  in  the  upper  hall. 

"I'm  going  crazy,  Max,"  I  said.  "Nobody  will 
tell  me  anything,  and  I  can't  stand  it.  How  was 
he  hurt?  Who  hurt  him?" 

Max  looked  at  me  quite  a  long  time. 

"I'm  darned  if  I  understand  you,  Kit,"  he  said 
gravely.  "You  said  you  disliked  Harbison." 

"So  I  do — I  did,"  I  supplemented.  "But  whether 
I  like  him  or  not  has  nothing  to  do  with  it.  He  has 
been  injured — perhaps  murdered" — I  choked  a  little. 
"Which— which  of  you  did  it?" 

Max  took  my  hand  and  held  it,  looking  down  at 
me. 

"I  wish  you  could  have  cared  for  me  like  that," 
he  said  gently.  "Dear  little  girl,  we  don't  know  who 
hurt  him.  7  didn't,  if  that's  what  you  mean.  Per 
haps  a  flower-pot — " 

I  began  to  cry  then,  and  he  drew  me  to  him  and 
334 


IT   WAS    DELIRIUM 

let  me  cry  on  his  arm.  He  stood  very  quietly,  pat 
ting  my  head  in  a  brotherly  way  and  behaving  very 
well,  save  that  once  he  said : 

"Don't  cry  too  long,  Kit;  I  can  stand  only  a  cer 
tain  amount." 

And  just  then  the  nurse  opened  the  door  to  the 
studio,  and  with  Max's  arms  still  around  me,  I 
raised  my  head  and  looked  in. 

Mr.  Harbison  was  conscious.  His  eyes  were 
open,  and  he  was  staring  at  us  both  as  we  stood 
framed  by  the  doorway. 

He  lay  back  at  once  and  closed  his  eyes,  and  the 
nurse  shut  the  door.  There  was  no  use,  even  if  I  had 
been  allowed  in,  in  trying  to  explain  to  him.  To  at 
tempt  such  a  thing  would  have  been  to  presume  that 
he  was  interested  in  an  explanation.  I  thought  bit 
terly  to  myself  as  I  brought  the  nurse  cracked  ice  and 
struggled  to  make  beef  tea  in  the  kitchen,  that  lives 
had  been  wrecked  on  less. 

Dal  was  allowed  ten  minutes  in  the  sick-room 
during  the  afternoon,  and  he  came  out  looking  puz 
zled  and  excited.  He  refused  to  tell  us  what  he 

335 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

had  learned,  however,  and  the  rest  of  the  afternoon 
he  and  Jim  spent  in  the  cellar. 

The  day  dragged  on.  Down-stairs  people  ate  and 
read  and  wrote  letters,  and  outside  newspaper  men 
talked  together  and  gazed  over  at  the  house  and 
photographed  the  doctors  coming  in  and  the  doctors 
going  out.  As  for  me,  in  the  intervals  of  bringing 
things,  I  sat  in  Bella's  chair  in  the  upper  hall,  and 
listened  to  the  crackle  of  the  nurse's  starched  skirts. 

At  midnight  that  night  the  doctors  made  a  thor 
ough  examination.  When  they  came  out  they  were 
smiling. 

"He  is  doing  very  well,"  the  younger  one  said — 
he  was  hairy  and  dark,  but  he  was  beautiful  to  me. 
"He  is  entirely  conscious  now,  and  in  about  an  hour 
you  can  send  the  nurse  off  for  a  little  sleep.  Don't 
let  him  talk." 

And  so  at  last  I  went  through  the  familiar  door 
into  an  unfamiliar  room,  with  basins  and  towels  and 
bottles  around,  and  a  screen  made  of  Jim's  largest 
canvases.  And  some  one  on  the  improvised  bed 
turned  and  looked  at  me.  He  did  not  speak,  and 

336 


IT   WAS    DELIRIUM 

I  sat  down  beside  him.  After  a  while  he  put  his 
hand  over  mine  as  it  lay  on  the  bed. 

"You  are  much  better  to  me  than  I  deserve,"  he 
said  softly.  And  because  his  eyes  were  disconcert 
ing,  I  put  an  ice  cloth  over  them. 

"Much  better  than  you  deserve,"  I  said,  and 
patted  the  ice  cloth  to  place  gently.  He  fumbled 
around  until  he  found  my  hand  again,  and  we  were 
quiet  for  a  long  time.  I  think  he  dozed,  for  he 
roused  suddenly  and  pulled  the  cloth  from  his  eyes. 

"The — the  day  is  all  confused,"  he  said,  turning 
to  look  at  me,  "but — one  thing  seems  to  stand  out 
from  everything  else.  Perhaps  it  was  delirium,  but 
I  seemed  to  see  that  door  over  there  open,  and  you, 
outside,  with — with  Max.  His  arms  were  around 
you." 

"It  was  delirium,"  I  said  softly.  It  was  my  final 
lie  in  that  house  of  mendacity. 

He  drew  a  satisfied  breath,  and  lifting  my  hand, 
held  it  to  his  lips  and  kissed  it. 

"I  can  hardly  believe  it  is  you,"  he  said.  "I  have 
to  hold  firmly  to  your  hand  or  you  will  disappear. 

337 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

Can't  you  move  your  chair  closer?  You  are  miles 
away."  So  I  did  it,  for  he  was  not  to  be  excited. 

After  a  little— 

"It's  awfully  good  of  you  to  do  this.  I  have  been 
desperately  sorry,  Kit,  about  the  other  night.  It 
was  a  ruffianly  thing  to  do — to  kiss  you,  when  I 
thought — " 

"You  are  to  keep  very  still,"  I  reminded  him. 
He  kissed  my  hand  again,  but  he  persisted. 

"I  was  mad — crazy."  I  tried  to  give  him  some 
medicine,  but  he  pushed  the  spoon  aside.  "You  will 
have  to  listen/'  he  said.  "I  am  in  the  depths  of  self- 
disgust.  I — I  can't  think  of  anything  else.  You 
see,  you  seemed  so  convinced  that  I  was  the  black 
guard  that  somehow  nothing  seemed  to  matter." 

"I  have  forgotten  it  all,"  I  declared  generously, 
"and  I  would  be  quite  willing  to  be  friends,  only, 
you  remember  you  said — " 

"Friends!"  his  voice  was  suddenly  reckless,  and 
he  raised  on  his  elbow.  "Friends!  Who  wants  to 
be  friends  ?  Kit,  I  was  almost  delirious  that  night. 
The  instant  I  held  you  in  my  arms  it  was  all  over. 

338 


IT   WAS    DELIRIUM 

I  loved  you  the  first  time  I  saw  you.  I — I  suppose 
I'm  a  fool  to  talk  like  this." 

And,  of  course,  just  then  Dallas  had  to  open  the 
door  and  step  into  the  room.  He  was  covered  with 
dirt  and  he  had  a  hatchet  in  his  hand. 

"A  rope!"  he  demanded,  without  paying  any  at 
tention  to  us  and  diving  into  corners  of  the  room. 
"Good  heavens,  isn't  there  a  rope  in  this  confounded 
house !" 

He  turned  and  rushed  out,  without  any  explana 
tion,  and  left  us  staring  at  the  door. 

"Bother  the  rope!"  I  found  myself  forced  to 
look  into  two  earnest  eyes.  "Kit,  were  you  very 
angry  when  I  kissed  you  that  night  on  the  roof?" 

"Very,"  I  maintained  stoutly. 

"Then  prepare  yourself  for  another  attack  of 
rage !"  he  said.  And  Betty  opened  the  door. 

She  had  on  a  fetching  pale  blue  dressing-gown, 
and  one  braid  of  her  yellow  hair  was  pulled  care 
lessly  over  her  shoulder.  When  she  saw  me  on  my 
knees  beside  the  bed  (oh,  yes,  I  forgot  to  say  that, 
quite  unconsciously,  I  had  slid  into  that  position) 

339 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

she  stopped  short,  just  inside  the  door,  and  put  her 
hand  to  her  throat.  She  stood  for  quite  a  perceptible 
time  looking  at  us,  and  I  tried  to  rise.  But  Tom 
shamelessly  put  his  arm  around  my  shoulders  and 
held  me  beside  him.  Then  Betty  took  a  step  back 
and  steadied  herself  by  the  door-frame.  She  had 
really  cared,  I  knew  then,  but  I  was  too  excited  to 
be  sorry  for  her. 

"I — I  beg  your  pardon  for  coming  in,"  she  said 
nervously.  "But — they  want  you  down-stairs,  Kit. 
At  least,  I  thought  you  would  want  to  go,  but — 
perhaps — " 

Just  then  from  the  lower  part  of  the  house  came 
a  pandemonium  of  noises:  women  screaming,  men 
shouting,  and  the  sound  of  hatchet  strokes  and  splin 
tering  wood.  I  seized  Betty  by  the  arm,  and  to 
gether  we  rushed  down  the  stairs. 


340 


CHAPTER  XXIII 

COMING 

THE  second  floor  was  empty.    A 
table  lay  overturned  at  the  top 
of   the   stairs,    and    a   broken 
flower  vase  was  weltering  in 
;/  its  own  ooze.    Part  way  down 
r  Betty   stepped    on   something 
sharp,  that  proved  to  be  the 
Japanese  paper  knife  from  the 
den.     I  left  her  on  the  stairs  ex 
amining  her  foot,  and  hurried  to  the  lower  floor. 

Here  everything  was  in  the  utmost  confusion. 
Aunt  Selina  had  fainted,  and  was  sitting  in  a  hall 
chair  with  her  head  rolled  over  sidewise  and  the 
poker  from  the  library  fireplace  across  her  knees. 
No  one  was  paying  any  attention  to  her.  And  Jim 
was  holding  the  front  door  open,  while  three  of  the 

341 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

guards  hesitated  in  the  vestibule.  The  noises  con 
tinued  from  the  back  of  the  house,  and  as  I  stood  on 
the  lowest  stair  Bella  came  out  from  the  dining- 
room,  with  her  face  streaked  with  soot,  and  carrying 
a  kettle  of  hot  water. 

"Jim,"  she  called  wildly.  "While  Max  and  Dal 
are  below,  you  can  pour  this  down  from  the  top. 
It's  boiling." 

Jim  glanced  back  over  his  shoulder.  "Carry  out 
your  own  murderous  designs,"  he  said.  And  then, 
as  she  started  back  with  it,  "Bella,  for  Heaven's 
sake,"  he  called,  "have  you  gone  stark  mad?  Put 
that  kettle  down." 

She  did  it  sulkily  and  Jim  turned  to  the  police 
man. 

"Yes,  I  know  it  was  a  false  alarm  before,"  he  ex 
plained  patiently,  "but  this  is  genuine.  It  is  just  as 
I  tell  you.  Yes,  Flannigan  is  in  the  house  some 
where,  but  he's  hiding,  I  guess.  We  could  manage 
the  thing  very  well  ourselves,  but  we  have  no  cart 
ridges  for  our  revolvers."  Then  as  the  noise  from 
the  rear  redoubled,  "If  you  don't  come  in  and  help, 

342 


COMING 

I  will  telephone  for  the  fire  department/'  he  con 
cluded  emphatically. 

I  I  ran  to  Aunt  Selina  and  tried  to  straighten  her 
head.  In  a  moment  she  opened  her  eyes,  sat  up 
and  stared  around  her.  She  saw  the  kettle  at 
once. 

r  "What  are  you  doing  with  boiling  water  on  the 
floor?"  she  said  to  me,  with  her  returning  voice. 
"Don't  you  know  you  will  spoil  the  floor?"  The 
ruling  passion  was  strong  with  Aunt  Selina,  as 
usual. 

I  could  not  find  out  the  trouble  from  any  one: 
people  appeared  and  disappeared,  carrying  strange 
articles.  Anne  with  a  rope,  Dal  with  his  hatchet, 
Bella  and  the  kettle,  but  I  could  get  a  coherent  ex 
planation  from  no  one.  When  the  guards  finally 
decided  that  Jim  was  in  earnest,  and  that  the  rest  of 
us  were  not  crawling  out  a  rear  window  while  he 
held  them  at  the  door,  they  came  in,  three  of  them 
and  two  reporters,  and  Jim  led  them  to  the  butler's 
pantry. 

Here  we  found  Anne,  very  white  and  shaky,  with 
343 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

the  pantry  table  and  two  chairs  piled  against  the 
door  of  the  kitchen  slide,  and  clutching  the  chamois- 
skin  bag  that  held  her  jewels.  She  had  a  bottle  of 
Burgundy  open  beside  her,  and  was  pouring  her 
self  a  glass  with  shaking  hands  when  we  appeared. 
She  was  furious  at  Jim. 

"I  very  nearly  fainted,"  she  said  hysterically.  "I 
might  have  been  murdered,  and  no  one  would  have 
cared.  I  wish  they  would  stop  that  chopping,  I'm 
so  nervous  I  could  scream." 

Jim  took  the  Burgundy  from  her  with  one  hand 
and  pointed  the  police  to  the  barricaded  door  with 
the  other. 

"That  is  the  door  to  the  dumb-waiter  shaft,"  he 
said.  "The  lower  one  is  fastened  on  the  inside,  in 
some  manner.  The  noises  commenced  about  eleven 
o'clock,  while  Mr.  Brown  was  on  guard.  There 
were  scraping  sounds  first,  and  later  the  sound  of  a 
falling  body.  He  roused  Mr.  Reed  and  myself,  but 
when  we  examined  the  shaft  everything  was  quiet, 
and  dark.  We  tried  lowering  a  candle  on  a  string, 
but — it  was  extinguished  from  below," 

344 


COMING 

The  reporters  were  busily  removing  the  table  and 
chairs  from  the  door. 

"If  you  have  a  rope  handy/'  one  of  them  said,  "I 
will  go  down  the  shaft." 

(Dal  says  that  all  reporters  should  have  been  po 
licemen,  and  that  all  policemen  are  natural  news 
gatherers.) 

"The  cage  appears  to  be  stuck,  half-way  between 
the  floors,"  Jim  said.  "They  are  cutting  through 
the  door  in  the  kitchen  below." 

They  opened  the  door  then  and  cautiously  peered 
down,  but  there  was  nothing  to  be  seen.  I  touched 
Jim  gingerly  on  the  arm. 

"Is  it— is  it  Flannigan,"  I  asked,  "shut  in  there?" 

"No — yes — I  don't  know,"  he  returned  absently. 
"Run  along  and  don't  bother,  Kit.  He  may  take  to 
shooting  any  minute." 

Anne  and  I  went  out  then  and  shut  the  door,  and 
went  into  the  dining-room  and  sat  on  our  feet,  for 
of  course  the  bullets  might  come  up  through  the 
floor.  Aunt  Selina  joined  us  there,  and  Bella,  and 
the  Mercer  girls,  and  we  sat  around  and  talked  in 

345 


"  GOOD   LORD  !     ON   THE   STAIRS  TO   THE  ROOF  !     YOU  ! 


COMING 

whispers,  and  Leila  Mercer  told  of  the  time  Her 
grandfather  had  had  a  struggle  with  an  escaped  lu 
natic. 

In  the  midst  of  the  excitement  Tom  appeared  in  a 
bath-robe,  looking  very  pale,  with  a  bandage  around 
his  head,  and  the  nurse  at  his  heels  threatening  to 
leave  and  carrying  a  bottle  of  medicine  and  a  spoon. 
He  went  immediately  to  the  pantry,  and  soon  we 
could  hear  him  giving  orders  and  the  rest  hurrying 
around  to  obey  them.  The  hammering  ceased,  and 
the  silence  was  even  worse.  It  was  more  suggestive. 

In  about  fifteen  minutes  there  was  a  thud,  as  if 
the  cage  had  fallen,  and  the  sound  of  feet  rushing 
down  the  cellar  stairs.  Then  there  were  groans  and 
loud  oaths,  and  everybody  talking  at  once,  below, 
and  the  sound  of  a  struggle.  In  the  dining-room  we 
all  sat  bent  forward,  with  straining  ears  and  quick 
ened  breath,  until  we  distinctly  heard  some  one 
laugh.  Then  we  knew  that,  whatever  it  was,  it  was 
over,  and  nobody  was  killed. 

The  sounds  came  closer,  were  coming  up  the 
stairs  and  into  the  pantry.  Then  the  door  swung 

347 


WHEN    A    MAN    MARRIES 

open,  and  Tom  and  a  policeman  appeared  in  the 
doorway,  with  the  others  crowding  behind.  Be 
tween  them  they  supported  a  grimy,  unshaven  ob 
ject,  covered  with  whitewash  from  the  wall  of  the 
shaft,  an  object  that  had  its  hands  fastened  together 
with  handcuffs,  and  that  leered  at  us  with  a  pair  of 
the  most  villainously  crossed  eyes  I  have  ever  seen. 

None  of  us  had  ever  seen  him  before. 

"Mr.  Lawrence  McGuirk,  better  known  as 
Tubby,'  "  Tom  said  cheerfully.  "A  celebrity  in  his 
particular  line,  which  is  second-story  man  and  all- 
round  rascal.  A  victim  of  the  quarantine,  like 
ourselves." 

"We've  missed  him  for  a  week,"  one  of  the 
guards  said  with  a  grin.  "We've  been  real  anxious 
about  you,  Tubby.  Ain't  a  week  goes  by,  when 
you're  in  health,  that  we  don't  hear  something  of 
you." 

Mr.  McGuirk  muttered  something  under  his 
breath,  and  the  men  chuckled. 

"It  seems,"  Tom  said,  interpreting,  "that  he 
doesn't  like  us  much.  He  doesn't  like  the  food,  and 

348 


COMING 

he  doesn't  like  the  beds.  He  says  just  when  he  got 
a  good  place  fixed  up  in  the  coal  cellar,  Flannigan 
found  it,  and  is  asleep  there  now,  this  minute." 

Aunt  Selina  rose  suddenly  and  cleared  her  throat. 

"Am  I  to  understand,"  she  asked  severely,  "that 
from  now  on  we  will  have  to  add  two  newspaper 
reporters,  three  policemen  and  a  burglar  to  the  oc 
cupants  of  this  quarantined  house  ?  Because,  if  that 
is  the  case,  I  absolutely  refuse  to  feed  them." 

But  one  of  the  reporters  stepped  forward  and 
bowed  ceremoniously. 

"Madam,"  he  said,  "I  thank  you  for  your  kind 
invitation,  but — it  will  be  impossible  for  us  to  ac 
cept.  I  had  intended  to  break  the  good  news  earlier, 
but  this  little  game  of  burglar-in-a-corner  prevented 
me.  The  fact  is,  your  Jap  has  been  discovered  to 
have  nothing  more  serious  than  chicken-pox,  and — 
if  you  will  forgive  a  poultry  yard  joke,  there  is  no 
longer  any  necessity  for  your  being  cooped  up." 

Then  he  retired,  quite  pleased  with  himself. 

One  would  have  thought  we  had  exhausted  our 
capacity  for  emotion,  but  Jim  said  a  joyful  emotion 

349 


WHEN   A   MAN    MARRIES 

was  so  new  that  we  hardly  knew  how  to  receive  it. 
Every  one  shook  hands  with  every  one  else,  and 
even  the  nurse  shared  in  the  excitement  and  gave 
Jim  the  medicine  she  had  prepared  for  Tom. 

Then  we  all  sat  down  and  had  some  champagne, 
and  while  they  were  waiting  for  the  police  wagon, 
they  gave  some  to  poor  McGuirk.  He  was  still 
quite  shaken  from  his  experience  when  the  dumb 
waiter  stuck.  The  wine  cheered  him  a  little,  and  he 
told  his  story,  in  a  voice  that  was  creaky  from  dis 
use,  while  Tom  held  my  hand  under  the  table. 

He  had  had  a  dreadful  week,  he  said ;  he  spent  his 
days  in  a  closet  in  one  of  the  maids'  rooms — the  one 
where  we  had  put  Jim.  It  was  Jim  waking  out  of 
a  nap  and  declaring  that  the  closet  door  had  moved 
by  itself  and  that  something  had  crawled  under  his 
bed  and  out  of  the  door,  that  had  roused  the  sus 
picions  of  the  men  in  the  house — and  he  slept  at 
night  on  the  coal  in  the  cellar.  He  was  actually  tear 
ful  when  he  rubbed  his  hand  over  his  scrubby  chin, 
and  said  he  hadn't  had  a  shave  for  a  week.  He  took 
somebody's  razor,  he  said,  but  he  couldn't  get  hold 
of  a  portable  mirror,  and  every  time  he  lathered  up 


COMING 

and  stood  in  front  of  the  glass  in  the  dining-room 
sideboard,  some  one  came  and  he  had  had  to  run  and 
hide.  He  told,  too,  of  his  attempts  to  escape,  of  the 
board  on  the  roof,  of  the  home-made  rope  and  the 
hole  in  the  cellar,  and  he  spoke  feelingly  of  the  pearl 
collar  and  the  struggle  he  had  made  to  hide  it.  He 
said  that  for  three  days  it  was  concealed  in  the  pocket 
of  Jim's  old  smoking  coat  in  the  studio. 

We  were  all  rather  sorry  for  him,  but  if  we  had 
made  him  uncomfortable,  think  of  what  he  had  done 
to  us.  And  for  him  to  tell,  as  he  did  later  in  court, 
that  if  that  was  high  society  he  would  rather  be  a 
burglar,  and  that  we  starved  him,  and  that  the 
women  had  to  dress  each  other  because  they  had  no 
lady's-maids,  and  that  the  whole  lot  of  us  were  in 
love  with  one  man,  it  was  downright  malicious. 

The  wagon  came  for  him  just  as  he  finished  his 
story,  and  we  all  went  to  the  door.  In  the  vestibule 
Aunt  Selina  suddenly  remembered  something,  and 
she  stepped  forward  and  caught  the  poor  fellow  by 
the  arm. 

"Young  man,"  she  said  grimly.  "I'll  thank  you  to 
return  what  you  took  from  me  last  Tuesday  night." 

35* 


COMING 


COMING 

McGuirk  stared,  then  shuddered  and  turned  sud 
denly  pale. 

"Good  Lord!"  he  ejaculated.  "On  the  stairs  to 
thereof!  You!" 

They  led  him  away  then,  quite  broken,  with  Aunt 
Selina  staring  after  him.  She  never  did  understand. 
I  could  have  explained,  but  it  was  too  awful. 

On  the  steps  McGuirk  turned  and  took  a  farewell 
glance  at  us.  Then  he  waved  his  hand  to  the  police 
men  and  reporters  who  had  gathered  around. 

"Good-by,  fellows,"  he  called  feebly.  "I  ain't 
sorry,  I  ain't.  Jail'll  be  a  paradise  after  this." 

And  then  we  went  to  pack  our  trunks. 

Note  from  Max  which  came  the  next  day  with  its 
enclosure. 

MY  DEAR  KIT — The  enclosed  trunk  tag  was  used 
on  my  trunk,  evidently  by  mistake.  Higgins  discov 
ered  it  when  he  was  unpacking  and  returned  it  to  me 
under  the  misapprehension  that  I  had  written  it.  I 
wish  I  had.  I  suppose  there  must  be  something  at 
tractive  about  a  fellow  who  has  the  courage  to  write 
a  love  letter  on  the  back  of  a  trunk  tag,  and  who 

353 


WHEN   A    MAN    MARRIES 

doesn't  give  a  tinker's  damn  who  finds  it.  But  for 
my  peace  of  mind,  ask  him  not  to  leave  another  one 
around  where  I  will  come  across  it.  MAX. 

Written  on  the  back  of  the  trunk  tag. 

Don't  you  know  that  I  won't  see  you  until  to-mor 
row  ?  For  Heaven's  sake,  get  away  from  this  crowd 
and  come  into  the  den.  If  you  don't  I  will  kiss  you 
before  everybody.  Are  you  coming  ?  T. 

Written  below. 
No  indeed.    K. 

'This  was  scratched  out  and  beneath. 
Coming. 


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